My Principal (Headmistress) at school was a very unlikely nun of sorts. Her name you needn't guess. I must confess before I proceed any further that I am shit scared writing this post, shit scared. Most of my life and going good still I've always been scared of people who have been bestowed of the divine duty of educating me and making me a fine woman. I fear them all from my favourites, the ones I truly respect to those I completely detest. I change my path, I look away, I might even run, I do it all.
This piece is not about some deep influence she's had on my life. She never really taught me at school, a little catechism maybe and the singing in the choir, nor was she the friendly sweet nun. The entire school was petrified of her, I hate to say this but most kids didn't like her, my friends didn't. Strange but I don't particularly remember how I felt about her then. But if you asked me now to name one awesome gorgeous woman I know I'd say, her. In fact I'd say she's more charming than any goddamn actress.
On a glance she might seem very ordinary looking, but if you looked longer maybe you'd see what I see and maybe understand why I'm so gaga over her. I'm not too good with guessing peoples age, I'd say she's forty two. The only piece of clothing you'll ever see her in is an off white saree or a grey saree, nun remember. She dyes her hair, she pull it back in an elongated clip or holds it up in a bun. No don't get the idea that wish to talk of good looks here. Yea I absolutely droole over hot creatures, men and women. I use the word hot not less than twenty times a day. But you can even trust a loser writer on this one that you can't write of hotness, it's so uncool. No offence meant but I can never imagine myself to be a fashion writer as much as I like that stuff.
She is to me almost a synonym of joy. When I think of her I can see her easy smile and how you could always see that she'll always be nothing but happy. Not like she smiled around at school all the time, she mostly frowned, it was her job I guess.
Now I think she was so different from everybody around her. The other nuns were jaded and bitter, thought weirdly, they were humans of another kind. We were too young. The teachers were mostly married and life for them was family alone. The younger teachers were pretty brainless. She was different from us all. She lived in a room of which I have no clue. She seemed so content all the time. She seemed to like reading a lot, I don't what she read though. She covered her books and we happily spread rumours that she was reading porn of sorts (I'm sure that's not the word we used then). She loved to sing and she sang beautifully in the choir. Unfortunately the conclusion that I've drawn from most older people I've seen is that their discontent at life increases as they grow older. But she wasn't like that. She was too happy, too perfect, too free for her time and place.
When we finished school at sixteen, all my friends and me howled and cried like crazy. We believed that leaving school was a tragedy forced on us, it would sooner or later break the bonds, we thought it was the end of our lives together, we thought separation would come in the way of us being family. We were so wrong you can never leave school can you. None of us have I know for a fact. We're the best of friends, we know we're family that will never leave.
Back then I never thought I'd run into my Principal ever again. Well I did. I first ran into her last winter in Delhi's big church. I saw her and before I could put my thoughts together she waved. I walked to her and next I was holding her hand and talking. The usual updates etc. I was so thrilled to meet her. After that I ran into her a couple of times more and she told me too that she was really happy to see me around so often.
There's this feast called "Christ the King". It's a really big sunday for the Delhi church. On that Sunday Christians from all Delhi from all smaller churches come to the big church. That day I saw her in the front in the choir just like in school. How I wished I was in the choir too. There was this kinda hot priest/brother who was leading the choir and I found myself thinking "I bet he has a crush on her/ they have a thing for each other" just like we'd anticipate in school whom she liked, and how many lovers she might have (Sinners!)
I saw her again at Christ the King this winter, in the choir and stared at her in awe. She was still the same, so fucking perfect.
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Ours was a superkool school, we had over twelve hours of disco music in the auditorioum on weekends. Our seniors played the song real loud if she happened to be nearby. And we oooh aahhed, we were scandalised.
I really like the song by the way. It's about the best kind of love. When you're so happy loving even if it's totally fucked. When you love even when there's no chance of being loved in return and it's the only thing that can make you happy.
And the happy tune could be the background to a video of her happy face.
