Skylab then, Chandrayaan now!

The last couple of weeks have not been easy. The entire nation felt the pain- the Chandrayaan mission that came so close to crowning glory and yet so far. Next time, we will surely make it. While losing contact with the Lander Vikram is extremely disheartening, the comforting point is that at least, it is not a life and death situation.
Many moons ago (no pun intended), it was almost a life and death situation! The year was 1979- the US lost contact with the Space Station Skylab. The spacecraft was now hurtling towards the earth, on a certain collision course! It was a harrowing time, which will be recalled by those who lived through it. The more I read about losing contact with the Lander Vikram, those childhood images of Bombay (as it was called then)...come floating by, images of a different time and age.


The weeks leading to the touchdown of the Skylab were lively. Newspapers carried elaborate diagrams charting the course of the Skylab- where it would re-enter the earth's atmosphere, where it would break-up and where it would crash. Though every place on the planet was equally vulnerable, we were convinced it would strike our neighbourhood and no other! As school kids, we overheard adults involved in animated discussions and tried to piece it together. How could someone goof up and lose control to this extent- where the spacecraft would now crash over our head? It was like the tale of Bhasmasura or Frankenstein- a recipe for self-destruction! There were individual prayers, community gatherings, astrological predictions and astronomical calculations- nothing was left to chance! A sort of nervous excitement enveloped us, where anything in the sky, from a flying airplane to a dragonfly made us jump out of our skin!


A primary school kid's imagination runs riot. Science with its concepts like gravity was yet to pollute our flights of fantasy. We imagined Skylab's impact would resemble a game of marbles...a small marble striking a bigger one! Upon impact, the earth would be thrown into space, where it would do a few spins...before it came to rest at a different corner of the universe!  Alternatively, we liked to believe that it would compare to a stone flung into a full bucket of water. The collision in the ocean would spurt out a wall of water- so tall would be the waves at Juhu Beach!
Skylab took over our lives. If we constructed sentences in English class, it was all about doom, destruction and death. If we had to scare the life out of someone, we looked at the sky, screamed "Skylab" and pretended to run for cover! It worked a few times, until it became a standing joke, much like the boy who cried wolf! The film Sholay's iconic dialogue now had a new twist-"so ja bachcha nahi to Skylab aa jayega!" (“Baby, please sleep; if you don’t, Skylab will be here!”)
We pleaded with the Principal to declare a holiday until doomsday was over. Our fears were not unfounded. If we were to perish, it seemed reasonable that it should be at home, than at school. We wore the most sullen face, like inmates on a death roll. At the very least, we negotiated for a few more Games periods! The Principal was firm- it would be school as usual, regardless of doomsday. We felt gutted!


The fateful day was now close. Those were times when few homes had a TV. Our window to the world was a radio- hand-tuned to shortwave stations. One night, the news was out- the Skylab had finally crash-landed in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Australia. It was all over.
The sun rose the next morning with the same cheeriness. It was a day like any other. There was a stone-like silence in class- absolute disbelief it could be such an anti-climax. How we wished we could have established contact with Skylab and steered the crash to more familiar environs!
It would now be school as usual, the tedium of classes, homework, tests and exams. We sat in class solemnly, cupping our palms to the chin.
However, school kids do not take time to bounce back. At lunch break, it suddenly dawned upon us- life was not over yet! Now that Skylab had given us a new lease of life, we could look forward to many more games of marbles and 7-stones, football and Cricket! We flung the lunch-box away, let out a joyous yelp, picked up the Cricket bat and ran into the sun!
The Skylab then and the Chandrayaan now- they have filled our days with nail-biting excitement, regardless of whether they fully achieved their target. Who can complain now?

 

In search of happiness

Happiness is a slippery fellow! Give him the barest minimum, he readily accepts and comes home. But pamper him with a little excess of anything, he hesitates and runs away! It is a paradox, a conundrum that cannot be easily cracked.


Growing up, parents did not indulge the children as we do today. Spending was strict, both as a principle and the strain on the purse. Occasions to celebrate were marked and limited. Hence, it was with great fondness that we looked forward to incidents where the purse strings were loosened and indulgence was permitted. Sometimes, it was as simple as the purchase of an ice-cream cone. The rarity of the enjoyment created the magic. We savoured it, one lick at a time and competed with the sibling to prolong ones own cone for much longer than the other!  The impish delight to enjoy the last few licks, with extra zeal, while the other looked on, salivating silently, was a moment to cherish!
Contrast this with today's picture, where every weekend visit to the mall, is a time to binge. The refrigerator is stacked with ice-cream in buckets. Often, it goes unnoticed and has to be junked because it has remained much longer than the expiry date! It is a problem of plenty. We do enjoy the ice-cream even today. Except, that it has become common place and to that extent, the joy-quotient has plummeted by several notches.


There was a time when TV was black-and-white playing a single channel. Programs actually came to a close at night and it was only the next evening, you could watch TV again. Often, there was only one home with a TV and the entire neighbourhood gathered together to watch their favourite shows. The weekly round of "Chitrahaar",  soaps like "HumLog" and the mythlogical adaptations of 'Ramayan' were awaited with great excitement. The collective enjoyment made the happiness-index soar sky-high even if you watched only half the program because the power went off mid-way! Everyone watched the same programs and came fully prepared for lively and heated discussions at school the following day. Contrast this with today. We have lost track of the number of channels on TV. As far as movies, serials and Cricket go, everything is available simultaneously, just a twirl of the remote away. The endless choice and variety have spoilt us. We cannot recall that one film or that special Cricket innings, that left a mark for life! Discussions over TV programs cannot be conducted with the same gusto because everyone watches a different channel, a different program.  And the joy-score in all this?  It has taken a definite hit.


Today, it is easy to spot an eye-catching dress online and have it delivered home. Suddenly, you feel the urge to have a rasgulla, and in a few clicks of the mobile, it is on the dining table. It is all easy and affordable no doubt. We miss the point- the accessibility has made everything bland and ordinary. It has robbed us of that indescribable eagerness to look forward to a new dress, which was bought once a year during Diwali. Purchase of crackers was limited and just enough for everyone at home. But the happiness grew  many fold, when you  painstakingly separated the "100-wala" into individual elements so that you could prolong the enjoyment, one cracker at a time...the entire day.


Recall the excitement and trembling fingers with which you ripped open the envelope to read that fortnightly mail from home? Or hurrying to make that 5-minute trunk-call from a public phone booth, to a loved one, after 10 at night because it was cheaper? Often, even conversation was impossible, because the phone-line was poor; still, you longed to hear the ring of that distant voice! There was so much to say and so little time! And when someone returned home after a two-year "foreign trip", you scrutinized their face in total amazement, for their features had changed so unrecognizably, during the interim period! Now, social media has made it easy, in fact, too easy.  We can stalk someone on an hourly basis, regardless of where he is. The flip side is the loss; loss of that extra zing!


That said, what is the takeaway from this? We cannot go back to Stone Age in our quest for happiness. The older generation is also prone to exaggeration. The narration is often suspect, because with each retelling, they claim to have enjoyed even more! Conversation centered on "those days" leaves us feeling helpless since we can do nothing about it, stranded as we are, in today's time and age!
But one thing is clear- over indulgence sedates the mind so that it loses its keenness and its heightened ability to enjoy. The more we willingly limit our indulgence today, more the happiness, when such a special occasion automatically presents itself.
A mansion needs more than 2000 sq ft, multiple floors, a garden and a swimming pool. Happiness needs none of this; a 700 sq ft home is good enough. The choice is ours.