Is it 'childhood lost' for them...

It’s rainy season in India. Though it has not been raining enough to suffice that it’s a rainy season, it feels good!

The other day as I got ready to leave from office it started raining heavily. The first reaction while looking out of the window was - the drive back home is going to be messy and wet… as I waited in the lobby for the rains to subdued, I could see small water streams forming around and nostalgia hit me.

At various ages in life the rains had been responsible for bringing joy in my life. As a child I loved creating paper boats and derived great joy in seeing them stay afloat. We waited eagerly for the first rains and when they came … we friends got wet, splashed water and enjoyed to our hearts content.

In school, we found ways to miss (forget) the raincoat, cycled in the rains, drove through the puddles, splashing water every time we did that, ate hot bhajis and played football… Nothing changed in college, only the cycles were replaced by bikes and snack became a little more elaborate. And rainy season picnics became the hot pick!

Still cuddling my good old days - I drove through the various residential areas and I was surprised to see not a single child enjoying the rains. No children frolicking in the rains- no paper boats, no bhajis, no football and no laughter!

Is it that the children today are so busy competing at every level that they have no time to relish these simple joys? Is it that the society has made it mandatory that everybody should belong to a cult that thinks complex, thinks prosperity and thinks knowledge… there is no place for such simple and naive feelings?

I am amazed to see small children well versed in computers but not able to remember when was the last time they got their hands dirty in the mud. Now this can be argued that soiling hands in the mud does not help them be more learned but computers would help them get an edge over other children. But come to think of it, if children start doing what we as elders do all the time- compete in this rat-race, when do they ever enjoy being children? ... the joy that most of us have had – naturally as a part of growing up.