Inkredible! Sacré (Royal) Bleu!

© 𝕾𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖍 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖓𝖉𝖗𝖆

 

A recent forward about my namesake and a pioneer of Sulekha siyahi, Mr Satish Chandra Dasgupta, takes me back so many years...

Not unlike many others, my own initiation on the "unhappily ever after" educational journey started around the age of two. While I don't actually recall this, family lore and oral history suggests that I had shown extraordinary interest in the educational endeavors of my older sister. She was already making amazing doodles on a slate with chalk. Some of the doodles even resembled letters and digits. The visiting uncles, aunties, grandparents, neighbors, the sabji wala and other assorted vendors, etc. were all doing oooh's and aaah's, which was music to my parents' ears and affirmation of their parental prowess. Tiger moms & dads, like most of us were blessed with, we just didn’t know it.

However, I am told that in my case, my real motivation was the irresistible aroma of chalk as a dietary supplement. My sister had quickly learned to keep her colorful little tin chalk-box on a high shelf, and it was no longer accessible for a quick bite between meals. 

Parents clearly did not believe in my "ignorance is bliss" adage. They were worried like many of their generation about the future of my toddler self in the increasingly uncertain world. If I didn't get started early, I had no chance of "making something" of myself. A distant cousin was already besmirching the family name by doing something scandalous that was only uttered in hushed tones. Later, I found out that he had gotten a tattoo. And moved away from his parent's house... in the same town. Horrors!

My vidyarambha sanskar was held on a certain Vasant Panchami day, I am told. What l do recall is that even after this ceremony, unsupervised access to my own set of chalk was still restricted... until I got past my preference for chalk as edibles.  

My next door buddy Babul had the misfortune of having mashi ma, his mom become aware of my initiation into the vidya journey. She got him initiated with his hatha kori at the same time. I don't believe he forgave me for this monumental and everlasting disruption to his carefree existence for a long time even though I had no control over it. 

Some time later, we both graduated from coughing through chalk-dust clouds that both of us set upon each other after wiping our slates dry and shaking the cleaning rag; moving on to the quill pen. Babul and I wasted no time wielding them as a jousting weapons guarding our ancient looking ink-wells. Somewhere in the mix were pencils and erasers - mostly cheap pencils with a prized Koh-i-noor or two. Some of the erasers that didn't just erase mistakes - they left horrible scars and obliterated the paper. Other erasers looked pretty and had nice aroma; we could only see them in other classmate's clutches. With unconcealed envy.  

This ink phase didn't go over too well for either myself or Babul. Even with extraordinary care, most of the ink seemed to take a undesirable meandering path towards everywhere else but on the paper in the notebook (#4 "copy", if you recall - the hindi copy with single spaced ruling and the angrezi copy with those 4 lines for uppercase/lowercase)... The Sulekha siyahi stained the lips, our fingers, the floor, the desk, the book, my clothes, the chair, the curtains and doors and windows. There was the "blotting paper" for the unintended smudges in the notebook, but it would quickly give up ghost after soaking ink past its saturation limits. Sulekha siyahi conquered all.  

My maternal grandfather had gifted me his old inkwell and quill pen with a great ceremony. We were only empowered with one color ink - the Sulekha Royal Blue. I recall in my father's study that there were two other colors - a red and a black inkwell as well. However, following a disastrous session sometime back, my father's study and especially his desk, the inks and his Parker pens were strictly off-limits with threats promises of bodily harm. You see, there was an unexplainable explosion of inks on some important papers, and the nibs on a couple of his precious pens resembled crossed fingers emojis 🤞... but neither Babul nor I know anything about it, mother promise, god promise, etc. Red ink was a no-no, used only to record business losses, which was not good. Black ink was, well, equally ashubha (inauspicious) and not to be used for educational purposes... like anything black. 

My parents decided quickly that getting me a fountain pen was a lot less expensive than the baths needed after these study sessions. The grumbling from household help about increased loads of laundry and repeated cleaning of floors and whitewashing of the walls of the study might have been a factor as well. 

At school, Sr Carmella was waiting in the wings. She immediately pronounced that my handwriting resembled, as she charitably described, done by a spider (or was it an ant) dipped in inkwell let loose on paper. She must have seen some potential in me as she patiently helped me correct my grip ("lightly like a paintbrush, not a dagger"), my wrist movements, ("wield like a feather, not a fist"), positioning of paper ("slightly angled, gentle touch not like a bricklayer"), etc. Sulekha Royal Blue forever!

Mr Dasgupta - from one Satish Chandra to another, I don't have enough ink to express myself. Deep and humble bows. 

© 𝕾𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖍 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖓𝖉𝖗𝖆