Every time I got scolded by my Mom or Dad or had a lost fight with my sister, I would run to the window of our bedroom and cry gazing out of it. Till we changed that house when I was about 6 years old.
I wasn't looking at the sky or the vehicles passing by on the road, but the huge municipal dustbin right across the street.There was a bond I shared with it that no one knew...
I don't remember much from that period of time, but there are a few I shall never forget. When I was about 3 year old, my sister told me something that affected me the way she would never have dreamed of. She told me how they got me...
My mom and my sister were going to the temple when they heard a wail from the dustbin. At first they decided to ignore and keep walking, but the cries were heart wrenching and they couldn't help but walk over to the huge dustbin (It was about 5 feet tall and very wide -supposed to hold the garbage for the whole neighborhood). There they saw a small baby lying over the garbage heap. My parents surely din't want another kid - they had their brilliant daughter and what else could they want (of course my sister was the one telling me- she won't belittle herself). But the child was plump, fair and the way it looked at my Mom and sister with those big eyes & pleading cries made them to pick her up. And guess what, that was me.Now, if you believed this story, am not surprised. I did, for a long long time, till I had solid proof that it was not true. If you din't believe, you are the smart ones like my sister. Most of my friends have heard stories like these, like having to buy them from the market, getting them in exchange for a kilo of tomato and stuff. But the way my sister told me and my Mom's silence when I went to confirm did the trick for me. (My mom had told a story to my sister like this when she was young, so my Mom had to support this prank of my dear sister).
However ridiculous it seems now, it din't feel so back then. I kept yearning to find my real parents, wondering who would they be, why they left me in the dustbin, what would have made them abandon me. If passer-bys couldn't resist taking me up, how could my real parents leave me just like that; and that too on top of rotting pile of garbage?
There was this sense of self worth that crumpled somewhere within ; me- the one my own parents din't want. Anything and everything my parents did for me, I saw it as if a favor to me - a debt I shall repay when am able enough to. I never dared to ask my parents for money (sure my parents were quite fine with it and never really knew why, except that they thought am a person who values money at such a young age) as I felt they were spending enough for my education, food and all.
Not that I wasn't naughty or din't enjoy my childhood, but there was a nagging pain that always gnawed within. By the time I was 12-13 I had finally believed that the story was just a cook-up , but by then it was too late to wipe off the attachment I felt for that particular dustbin (I am least interested in other dustbins). There was a bond I felt with the dustbin the way one feels with the cradle you slept in as a child.
I miss my Dustbin !!! (Now, that was just a dramatic over reaction)
