Today being the valentine day I would like to record a true story .It all began when during my morning constitutional I met an old lady.I was quite impressed with her agility as she is more than eighty years old.I really hope and pray that when we reach that age we remain as active as her .
As we sat talking Mrs.Awasthi remarked that long back when she was unmarried her closest friends and neighbours were also Saxenas but that was in Shahjehanpur .It was a coincidence but my Mamaji also lived there and we found that she was referring to them .She was very thrilled to hear that and than started asking about my Mamas ,Mausis and ofcourse my mother .I told her about everyone .She recounted many anecdotes and than asked about my Younger Mama by name ."Well he is fine but as you know he is eighty four he has become forgetful",I said ,In fact the last time I met him he couldnot recollect my name .'But he would remember me ,"there was so much confidence in her voice that I looked up startled '",We used to sing Talat Mehmood ,s songs together ,She explained .I knew my Mama to be a die hard fan of Talat Mahmood so she was correct .I was very intrigued .To remember something like this almost seventy years later there must have been something special between the two .Of course they belonged to different castes and maybe for Mama it was just fun but for her it was a memory so special that neither time nor age has dimmed it .
Mrs.Awasthi went away to visit her children abroad .she had a fair numberof grandchildren and also one or two great grand children also .I met her yesterday after seven or eight months .We chatted as usual ,exchanged news ,compared notes about America and Australia .Just as she was leaving Itold her about about my Mama,s death .She looked at me .smiled softly and said "We sang lovely songs together .'I was quite shaken by the depth and intensity of that simple sentence .She had got married ,had children .lived a full and busy life and yet that memory had always been with her . .Maybe in the usual humdrum of life the sound of those songs have been with her .Maybe the sweetness of those songs provided solace to her .No wonder she hoarded the memory all through seventy years and I wonder at the confidence she had of being remembered after all these years . Maybe it is the love about which ballads are written.