.....is a thief of the first grade!!
For a very long time I have wondered where my numerous pens, pencils, erasers, handkerchiefs, hair bands, clips, bits of paper on which I scribble phone numbers and countless such knick knacks of supreme importance vanish off. I mean, whenever I buy a set of six hankies, by default within the next five days (or even less) one is gone.
My pens disappear from my table very silently and discreetly.
I have no idea where all those hair scrunchies and fancy hair clips which I started accumulating at the beginning of the year, have gone.
I do not use pencils and erasers much ever since I left college and don't have to draw intricate biological diagrams, but come on, once in six months I do give in to my artistic cravings and pretend to sketch in my rather school girlish sketch book! But then, hey hey, where are my pencils? And erasers?
Strangely enough, when I have absolutely no necessity of these small things, I can clearly see them lying in abandon on my table - pens, pencils, erasers, hair clips, hankies and what have you. But the moment I need anything direly, you can bet your salary, it is gone. It's abso-freaking-lutely gone. Which is so humorously frustrating! (though not all that humorous when I have to note down this urgent number and I can't locate either pen or paper)
And I know who is behind this disappearing act.
It is the ghost. First rate thief ghost....sorry, ghost thief I mean. Whatever.
It never haunts or scares us.Neither does it cackle in spectral laughter in the middle of the night nor does it drape itself in a white chiffon sari and hold a candle in its hands to stroll around the entire house singing songs full of pain and longing in the distinct voice of Lata Mangeshkar. It is not even a handsome ruby-lips-diamante-skin vampire a la Robert Pattinson.
In fact, I have no idea what it looks like.
IT'S SIMPLY A BLOODY THIEF!!
Though I know how it came into our lives - well, my life to be precise.
Long long ago when your's truly was a toddler in pastel lace frocks, knickers and bibs, mommy dearest absolutely detested if any benevolent relative handed me a chocolate or a bag of potato wafers. Mum believed in Mother Nature and healthy home treats more than she did in Cadbury's or Lay's. So out the goodies went through the window...or in they went to the trash bin. And all I got to hear from her was "Boo Boo ate the choco." And the idiot that I was, I fell for it every single time.
And now, Boo Boo has grown into a full blown Frankenstein's monster.
Boo Boo now steals pens, pencils, erasers, bits of paper, hair bands, clips etc.
Of course, now when my mother asks me about my many missing things I do not blame the ghost. The one time I did, she looked at me as if I were a retard. Nobody will really believe that my knick knacks go missing because Boo Boo steals them.
Sometimes, though, I think the ghost is only trying to help me, you know. By giving me the perennial excuse for buying shiny, new, nice smelling things. Come on, how is a girl supposed to write if she can't find her pen? Or her five pens? Or seven? What can she do under such circumstances but go and buy herself a shiny new one!
And what about handkerchiefs? Am I not a well groomed lady of fine manners who carries dainty floral hankies with herself wherever she goes? Also, I happen to have some kind of collector's mania for handkerchiefs - the lighter, the whiter, the daintier the better. So when these cloth beauties are nicked by our ghost-in-residence, I need to replace them by...yes...purchasing more!!
I also think that the ghost is trying to make me aware of the many technical wonders of my mobile phone (apart from calling and texting) - so I can give up scribbling numbers on random bits of paper and can save them in the phonebook of my cell at the first go!
And anyway, somebody somewhere probably doesn't want me to ring up all those numbers I lost on random bits of paper.Divine conspiracy....or spectral...uh oh..don't know which.
************************************************************
My life with Boo Boo wasn't very bad you know, it was quite tolerable. Till Boo Boo crossed a line!
(pssst....I know it would have been better in terms of composition had I written the entire first part which you read above in past tense....but some how I didn't feel like using past tense.)
It so happened that we were told at the office to submit photocopies of our academic certificates and mark sheets starting from those of 10th standard. Therefore, one Saturday morning, at around 11 am, I hunted all my old certificates and score cards out, got sentimental looking at them and then walked off to the local shop that would make the desired number of photocopies and walked back home at around 12:30 pm.
LUNCH TIME!
I quickly dumped slash threw all my original mark sheets, certificates and their copies on my table and sat down at the table to hog. Weekend lunch....yummm....
Later in the afternoon, I caught a Weekend Special movie on a random TV channel and snoozed for about 45 minutes. After downing a plate of fruits around 5 pm, I put on my fancy Nike shoes and fancy clothes and went for my routine evening walk/jog/run (depends).
I came home at 7:30 pm (having stopped on the way to treat myself to an ice lolly), hit the shower and then prayed for a while. It is mandatory for everybody in our family to attend the evening prayer. I basically spend this time in begging the Almighty for a lot of things that I am not sure I deserve...or need. (I mean I have never worked hard enough to own a Mercedes. And nor do I have that kind of parking space.)
Then I pretended to help Mom in the kitchen for a while, stuffing random eatables into my mouth, before declaring that I was starving!
Dinner! Then some TV.
By 10 pm, when I finally retired to my den, I noticed my certificates and score cards (records of my merit, diligence and hard work and...well, a lot other sentimental things) lying in wild abandon on my study table. I felt bad for them. Poor certificates.
As I bunched them up, separated the photocopies that I had to submit the coming Monday and was about to tuck them safely back into the top drawer, I froze in terror!
The top most certificate on the pile of certificates, my class XIIth mark sheet, my ORIGINAL class XIIth marksheet was missing.
I look around like a fool for sometime and try to recall if I may have left it at the copier's store.
ummmmm......
ummmm......
No. I haven't. I am sure I haven't.
THAT WAS THE LAST STRAW! Clearly the ghost in our house had exceeded its limits. Pens and clips are fine. But important make or break mark sheets with nice marks? NOT FINE!
************************************************************
The next day, Sunday, when the domestic help arrives, Mom orders me to push my study table aside from its years old position and asks her to clean behind and under the table.
HORRORS!
I assure mom again and again that I will accomplish this very task the next weekend myself. Without anyone's help. (I am not really sure I want my table to be removed in front of my mom and the domestic help....I should have kept cleaning under and behind it at more regular intervals than.....well....than....well....once a year)
But she will have none of it. She wants it done right here, right now. My mistake. May be I shouldn't have let it out in the morning that I cannot find my XII Boards mark sheet.
And so, with a great deal of energy and all sorts of sounds, I push my heavily laden study table from its old position.
The next few seconds pass in slow motion as three pairs of eyes collectively gaze down at the unraveled scene.
THERE IS POTENTIAL FOR THE GROWTH OF A WHOLE NEW CIVILIZATION DOWN HERE!
Over the next two rather long hours, I watch our resident ghost being exorcised slowly yet thoroughly.
Five pens long considered lost, seven handkerchiefs covered with layers of time (read dust), four hair clips and an equal number of hair bands, two permanent markers, one old CD (with a crack), three pencils, one eraser, one pencil sharpener, two combs and an old key ring. Along with random bits of papers with phone numbers and messages scribbled ("going to movie.back by 5", "keys in top drawer" etc), which have blown off or slipped from my table and gone under it...........and the most prominent item of them all, the mark sheet of my XIIth standard board exams. (It must have blown in the wind and slipped and fallen under the table yesterday, when I had dumped all the certificates on my table and gone ahead with the rest of the evening)
In short, I get to see all my things, treasures, knick knacks and stuff the ghost in our house had stolen over the course of the last year.
While dusting the dust out, the maid is repeatedly questioning me about what is to be kept and what is to be discarded.
Let me not go into what I heard from my mother as these things were in the process of retrieval. Its not really the proudest moment of my life.
The only hint is that words like "careless", "lazy", "useless" featured largely in her impassioned speech.
*******************************************************
Just that, it wasn't the thief I always thought it to be.
For a very long time I have wondered where my numerous pens, pencils, erasers, handkerchiefs, hair bands, clips, bits of paper on which I scribble phone numbers and countless such knick knacks of supreme importance vanish off. I mean, whenever I buy a set of six hankies, by default within the next five days (or even less) one is gone.
My pens disappear from my table very silently and discreetly.
I have no idea where all those hair scrunchies and fancy hair clips which I started accumulating at the beginning of the year, have gone.
I do not use pencils and erasers much ever since I left college and don't have to draw intricate biological diagrams, but come on, once in six months I do give in to my artistic cravings and pretend to sketch in my rather school girlish sketch book! But then, hey hey, where are my pencils? And erasers?
Strangely enough, when I have absolutely no necessity of these small things, I can clearly see them lying in abandon on my table - pens, pencils, erasers, hair clips, hankies and what have you. But the moment I need anything direly, you can bet your salary, it is gone. It's abso-freaking-lutely gone. Which is so humorously frustrating! (though not all that humorous when I have to note down this urgent number and I can't locate either pen or paper)
And I know who is behind this disappearing act.
It is the ghost. First rate thief ghost....sorry, ghost thief I mean. Whatever.
It never haunts or scares us.Neither does it cackle in spectral laughter in the middle of the night nor does it drape itself in a white chiffon sari and hold a candle in its hands to stroll around the entire house singing songs full of pain and longing in the distinct voice of Lata Mangeshkar. It is not even a handsome ruby-lips-diamante-skin vampire a la Robert Pattinson.
In fact, I have no idea what it looks like.
IT'S SIMPLY A BLOODY THIEF!!
Though I know how it came into our lives - well, my life to be precise.
Long long ago when your's truly was a toddler in pastel lace frocks, knickers and bibs, mommy dearest absolutely detested if any benevolent relative handed me a chocolate or a bag of potato wafers. Mum believed in Mother Nature and healthy home treats more than she did in Cadbury's or Lay's. So out the goodies went through the window...or in they went to the trash bin. And all I got to hear from her was "Boo Boo ate the choco." And the idiot that I was, I fell for it every single time.
And now, Boo Boo has grown into a full blown Frankenstein's monster.
Boo Boo now steals pens, pencils, erasers, bits of paper, hair bands, clips etc.
Of course, now when my mother asks me about my many missing things I do not blame the ghost. The one time I did, she looked at me as if I were a retard. Nobody will really believe that my knick knacks go missing because Boo Boo steals them.
Sometimes, though, I think the ghost is only trying to help me, you know. By giving me the perennial excuse for buying shiny, new, nice smelling things. Come on, how is a girl supposed to write if she can't find her pen? Or her five pens? Or seven? What can she do under such circumstances but go and buy herself a shiny new one!
And what about handkerchiefs? Am I not a well groomed lady of fine manners who carries dainty floral hankies with herself wherever she goes? Also, I happen to have some kind of collector's mania for handkerchiefs - the lighter, the whiter, the daintier the better. So when these cloth beauties are nicked by our ghost-in-residence, I need to replace them by...yes...purchasing more!!
I also think that the ghost is trying to make me aware of the many technical wonders of my mobile phone (apart from calling and texting) - so I can give up scribbling numbers on random bits of paper and can save them in the phonebook of my cell at the first go!
And anyway, somebody somewhere probably doesn't want me to ring up all those numbers I lost on random bits of paper.Divine conspiracy....or spectral...uh oh..don't know which.
************************************************************
My life with Boo Boo wasn't very bad you know, it was quite tolerable. Till Boo Boo crossed a line!
(pssst....I know it would have been better in terms of composition had I written the entire first part which you read above in past tense....but some how I didn't feel like using past tense.)
It so happened that we were told at the office to submit photocopies of our academic certificates and mark sheets starting from those of 10th standard. Therefore, one Saturday morning, at around 11 am, I hunted all my old certificates and score cards out, got sentimental looking at them and then walked off to the local shop that would make the desired number of photocopies and walked back home at around 12:30 pm.
LUNCH TIME!
I quickly dumped slash threw all my original mark sheets, certificates and their copies on my table and sat down at the table to hog. Weekend lunch....yummm....
Later in the afternoon, I caught a Weekend Special movie on a random TV channel and snoozed for about 45 minutes. After downing a plate of fruits around 5 pm, I put on my fancy Nike shoes and fancy clothes and went for my routine evening walk/jog/run (depends).
I came home at 7:30 pm (having stopped on the way to treat myself to an ice lolly), hit the shower and then prayed for a while. It is mandatory for everybody in our family to attend the evening prayer. I basically spend this time in begging the Almighty for a lot of things that I am not sure I deserve...or need. (I mean I have never worked hard enough to own a Mercedes. And nor do I have that kind of parking space.)
Then I pretended to help Mom in the kitchen for a while, stuffing random eatables into my mouth, before declaring that I was starving!
Dinner! Then some TV.
By 10 pm, when I finally retired to my den, I noticed my certificates and score cards (records of my merit, diligence and hard work and...well, a lot other sentimental things) lying in wild abandon on my study table. I felt bad for them. Poor certificates.
As I bunched them up, separated the photocopies that I had to submit the coming Monday and was about to tuck them safely back into the top drawer, I froze in terror!
The top most certificate on the pile of certificates, my class XIIth mark sheet, my ORIGINAL class XIIth marksheet was missing.
I look around like a fool for sometime and try to recall if I may have left it at the copier's store.
ummmmm......
ummmm......
No. I haven't. I am sure I haven't.
THAT WAS THE LAST STRAW! Clearly the ghost in our house had exceeded its limits. Pens and clips are fine. But important make or break mark sheets with nice marks? NOT FINE!
************************************************************
The next day, Sunday, when the domestic help arrives, Mom orders me to push my study table aside from its years old position and asks her to clean behind and under the table.
HORRORS!
I assure mom again and again that I will accomplish this very task the next weekend myself. Without anyone's help. (I am not really sure I want my table to be removed in front of my mom and the domestic help....I should have kept cleaning under and behind it at more regular intervals than.....well....than....well....once a year)
But she will have none of it. She wants it done right here, right now. My mistake. May be I shouldn't have let it out in the morning that I cannot find my XII Boards mark sheet.
And so, with a great deal of energy and all sorts of sounds, I push my heavily laden study table from its old position.
The next few seconds pass in slow motion as three pairs of eyes collectively gaze down at the unraveled scene.
THERE IS POTENTIAL FOR THE GROWTH OF A WHOLE NEW CIVILIZATION DOWN HERE!
Over the next two rather long hours, I watch our resident ghost being exorcised slowly yet thoroughly.
Five pens long considered lost, seven handkerchiefs covered with layers of time (read dust), four hair clips and an equal number of hair bands, two permanent markers, one old CD (with a crack), three pencils, one eraser, one pencil sharpener, two combs and an old key ring. Along with random bits of papers with phone numbers and messages scribbled ("going to movie.back by 5", "keys in top drawer" etc), which have blown off or slipped from my table and gone under it...........and the most prominent item of them all, the mark sheet of my XIIth standard board exams. (It must have blown in the wind and slipped and fallen under the table yesterday, when I had dumped all the certificates on my table and gone ahead with the rest of the evening)
In short, I get to see all my things, treasures, knick knacks and stuff the ghost in our house had stolen over the course of the last year.
While dusting the dust out, the maid is repeatedly questioning me about what is to be kept and what is to be discarded.
Let me not go into what I heard from my mother as these things were in the process of retrieval. Its not really the proudest moment of my life.
The only hint is that words like "careless", "lazy", "useless" featured largely in her impassioned speech.
*******************************************************
Now I keep all my things sorted and do not dump anything and everything on the table. I make ample use of its three spacious drawers and I check under and behind the table regularly for small things that may slip off and fall. I also keep a track of how many pens and hankies and clips and stuff I am purchasing and how many I actually have in my possession. I do not lose things anymore.
And with that the ghost in our house is gone forever. It is dead if ghosts can die.
Just that, it wasn't the thief I always thought it to be.
********************************************************************************
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I am a new author and I would be grateful for any kind of encouragement from my readers. It is a tough world out there for new authors!
Thanks once again! Hope you love reading my articles as much as I loved writing them!
I am a new author and I would be grateful for any kind of encouragement from my readers. It is a tough world out there for new authors!
Thanks once again! Hope you love reading my articles as much as I loved writing them!
You have left me wondering if your friendly ghost is the same entity who steals socks from my dryer ?
ReplyDeleteAlways just one sock...
I loved reading your story very much.
simply a delight.
thank you for sharing.
One Conscious Dreamer
Yes, every house has such resident ghosts...and they are the ones responsible for that one sock or that one glove getting divorced from its partner! Lol. Glad to know someone out there has been through the same experience as well! Its frustrating and humorous in equal measures!
DeleteThanks for liking the story! - strictly based of real life incidents ;)