Mid life - part 2, Pursuit of inner peace

Narrated till now

Pramod meets Ipsita in a flight and is awestruck by her beauty. He loses her business card and feels disappointed about it . His wife Susan asks him to attend yoga classes to cut his waist size and to maintain fitness.

Narration continues

“Gently close your eyes and relax” the yoga instructor said and continued “ Your yoga session for the day is over and let us now practice guided meditation. Stretch your lips and smile . Do not think of anything and keep listening to the voice you will hear in few minutes time”.

Pramod had joined yoga classes and was determined to reduce his tummy and become more fitter. The guided meditation went on for about ten minutes.

Towards the close the instructor said “Keep breathing and be aware of it. Take deep breaths and relax. Do not open you eyes until told to do so. You will realize at the end of this session that something different will happen and you will experience a new feeling”.

Couple of minutes later the participants were asked to open the eyes slowly.

Pramod initially rubbed his palms , carefully pressed the closed eyes with them and opened the eyes.

He looked around and a surprise was in store for him.

He say Ipsita sitting in the row ahead of him. He could not believe his stars. It was like a new hope rekindled and he realised that it was indeed a new and welcome feeling.

For a moment he lost sense of the place and caller her loudly “ Ipsita”. Everyone looked at him. It was not expected of any participant to speak out loudly in the session.

Ipsita turned back and with a big smile on her face said in a feeble voice “Hi”.

Pramod felt embarrassed, looked at the instructor and said sorry.

“So you also started yoga” Ispita said to Pramod. They were walking back to the car parking area after completion of the session.

“My wife felt that I needed the classes as my waist size was not reducing” he replied. Ipsita laughed and said “ Your wife is very wise lady”.

“Let us have coffee” he said and she nodded. They walked to the coffee shop and ordered for coffee.

“I thought you would call me” Pramod said. She was silent. He wondered if he had said anything wrong. She replied “ Was I expected to call?”

Pramod smiled . She continued “ You could have called me”.

He continued smiling and thought “ Well the game is on”.

He replied “ I wanted to call you but I misplaced your business card”.

“Save my number in you mobile memory” she said and showed her contacts wherein she had saved his name as ‘Pramod plane’.

The next few days were the most memorable ones for Pramod as he met her daily and after the classes they would spend some time either in coffee shop or walk together in the nearby park.

The course got over in a weeks time and the instructor told them to keep practicing and requested all the participants to attend weekend followup sessions every Sunday morning. Pramod and Ipsita were chosen as volunteers having the responsibility of calling people reminding them of the Sunday sessions. They both would meet in the coffee shop every Saturday evening and call all the participants on their mobiles.

“Pramod the phone is ringing” Susan shouted from the living room. She got up and went to the bedroom and realised that Pramod was in the wash room. She took the phone and answered the call saying “Hello”.

“Hi this is Ipsita” the reply came. Susan was surprised as she heard her name for the first time. She said “ Pramod is not here right now .Will you please call after five minutes”.

“Is it Susan?” Ipsita asked. Susan was surprised again and said “ Yes it is Susan here”.

“Hi Susan” she continued “ I am Ipsita , Pramod’s friend. I had gone out this evening and therefore could not meet Pramod in the coffee shop as usual to call all the yoga followup participants. Wanted to check if he had done it. By the way how is Bharati, your daughter? She looks very cute like you”.

Susan went silent. Every sentence she heard was news to her. She started wondering how come her husband has been meeting another lady so regularly and she was not aware of it.

Susan went back to the living room and closing her eyes started joining the dots to get some story out of it.

Pramod was not particular about his hairstyle and had poor dressing sense. But of late things were different. He would dress perfectly, sport well trimmed hair and shave regularly . Earlier the things he hated were flowers and flower bouquets. But of late he would get roses to her on every alternate day and appeared more romantic than before.

“hello Subha” Susan said answering the phone call. Subha Despande was family friend of the Kulkarnis and she knew Pramod for more than three decades as she was his neighbor in Hubli.

“Hi Susie how are you? You sound a bit upset. What happened?”Subha replied.

Susan told Subha about the phone call from Ipsita. Subha did not miss the chance to feed negative thoughts in Susan’s mind. She said “I know Pramod since three decades Susie. He is like that only.Before falling in love with you he was flirting around with Vandana Joshi in the college. He had a crush on me too” and she went on and on and hit the final nail  by saying “ Many men flirt. The rest want to”.

Pramod walked into the living room and next few minutes was at the receiving end as Susan fired him nonstop. She continued “ Pramod I am not so mean to question when you meet other women. You always share with me about the people you meet and interact. Only in this case you have kept me in dark. Should I believe that something is going on unnoticed?”.

He tried his best to defend himself but in vain. Things calmed down after couple of hours once he assured Susan that he would stop interacting with Ipsita stealthily.

“Get some bread from the supermarket” Susan said to Pramod.

Susan saw him walking slowly towards the supermarket which was about half a kilometer away. She had tears in her eyes. She was never so rude to him earlier. She felt that she had misjudged him in haste and he had no time or intent to think of any other woman.

Pramod stopped near a tree and called Ipsita “Hi Ipsita I called all the participants for the followup yoga. I will be at the place by 5.30 AM sharp in the morning”.

“Nice of you” she replied and continued “ I spoke to Susan today”.

“I know” he replied “ She was very happy to speak to you. Earlier she had heard about you from me. One more thing. She is going out early in the morning tomorrow. I should have breakfast outside. Shall we have it together?”

Men will be men. Always ready to flirt.