Had a strange dream about two weeks ago. I call it strange because i had to walk through my school days, in a flashback style. Why this dream occurred, i have no idea. For those of you who can't read my mind, i'll put my dream in words
here ;-). Or rather walk through my life's flashback. Have a tortoise coil ready and we'll start.
I was an average student in school. All through my primary schooling, i never had a pressure/fear worrying
about how good/bad i was with studies. I went to DAV mogappair, for my 4th standard and onwards till Tenth. I never settled there, meaning i felt very home-sick (can i say that ?) with my old school and my friends there. I never made new friends and also lost touch with my old friends, for the simple reason that we couldn't meet more often. I remember very vaguely that it was when i finished my 6th and stepped into the 7th that i began to feel some sense of realization of how good/bad i was in studies. It was also at that time cable television - satellite broadcasting had become a new rage of sorts and i too was sucked into all the glitz, like a moth to the fire. I spent most of (my non-school) time watching cartoons, cricket, other film-based TV programs & all other
nonsense on the idiot box. what not. I was becoming spoilt. Which meant i was found lagging in studies and reduced to somewhere between below average and poor kind of student. Merely scraping through some exams and not even managing to get a minimum mark (to pass) in some. I also remember not doing an assignment/home work - simply writing answers from the text books for the questions that the teacher gave us in the class. Least bothered about the consequences, i conveniently ignored the home work in favour of TV and got the stick at school, instead.
I was an outstanding student in this regard. Someone not doing an assignment can be chided once or be punished at the time. But someone who is supposed to have all the notes written in a notebook,and has never really cared to do it, will get punished in every class until he makes up for all the backlog in the notebook. Exactly what happened to me. It appears funny and crazy to me (now) that i never went back home thinking that i should make up for all this. Not one day. So i had to stand outside the class almost every day (that we had that subject on). Guess what, the situation got better with subjects with backlogs increasing. And i was the only one in a class of 38. It was embarrassing enough, but never attempted to correct it.[May be i was not too embarrassed as it was all boys' school]. Quite obviously, this also showed in my exams - lost interest in these subjects. If i come to think of it now, i can't imagine how addicted to the TV i was. I'm glad i got out of it.
Yes, later on after numerous periods of standing outside the class and a variety of other punishments - i completed the backlog and recovered from the 'defaulter' syndrome. But that didn't help me get back to where i was in studies. That took a couple of years i should say. But thankfully in time, just before my board exams. But of course, i was never comfortable with Mathematics. It painfully got worse with more complex notations and formulaes - wish i had someone to help with it back then. But i could never get it out of my life as it was necessary for me to pursue science group in my 12th and follow it up with Engineering (Especially computers).
Like i said, i have no idea why this occurred as a dream to me now. Somehow i have a feeling it could be coz of how strongly these events are etched in my memory, and will stay that way for life. I wish i had a chance to go back in life to correct these and be a good student or atleast be a sensible-average school guy rather. Some of the important years in my life were lost, i guess.
I had no reason to bring these out if i hadn't dreamt of all this. Though i should say i feel better as i'm inching close to the end of this post, having unloaded some really unpleasant memories.
Catch up with you later in a lighter post......
Ta
