Some of the most memorable books in one's lives are forgotten by the time they grow old. i remember when i was in class 3, we did not have the permission to go to the school library. the library was meant for classes 5 to 10 only and it was so tempting to peep into the huge room with so many brown polished cupboards , a gateway to the books of all the famous authors in one place! ande for that one had to wait till they were promoted to class 5! its scary, what if i failed a year suddenly? it would mean the library doors would remain closed to me for even a greater period of time...
my class 3 teacher was Mrs Valsa Anthony , she used to give out thin coloured children's storybooks to us each wednesday after class was over from a cupboard at the back of the class beside which we used to line up our bags and bottles. there was a boy called shrey who used to always spill water and the class used to tease him saying - oh shrey - you have WETTED the floor again! i fondly remember a book, by the name of "the clock struck thirteen". i donot remember the author at all, because i did not know that one had to even read the author's name, as logically for a child, it was a storybook she was holding and only the story inside the book seemed important to her. the story was about a boy and his family and the world that surrounded him . he did not believe in magic and one day, he lay awake to find out that after midnight the clock in the tower struck thirteen times, suddenly everything changed all around him and he was filled with a mesmerizing sense of charm and magic all around him. i remember the cover vividly too. it was a figure of the boy in pale blue against the dark night sky with a barn in the background and a clocktower where the hands of the clock was showing 13, studded with a sheen of stars giving it a haunting look.
i never came across this book ever in my life and in my sheer excitement of wanting to share the magic with my classmates i had eagerly traded the book with some other fantasy tale. that was my first taste of magic, without a magician, without a wand or even a spell book... but it haunts me even today. The melodrama queen of hopes and foolish dreams that i am, still believe that this same magic which struck me at such a young age, brings me back that book some day. i would love to read through it again. we tend to forget many things in life, good memories we keep and disturbing ones we force back to the back of our heads. this is one memory which will stay with me forever. its a direct link to my childhood. i want to be awake too when the clock strikes thirteen the next time.
my class 3 teacher was Mrs Valsa Anthony , she used to give out thin coloured children's storybooks to us each wednesday after class was over from a cupboard at the back of the class beside which we used to line up our bags and bottles. there was a boy called shrey who used to always spill water and the class used to tease him saying - oh shrey - you have WETTED the floor again! i fondly remember a book, by the name of "the clock struck thirteen". i donot remember the author at all, because i did not know that one had to even read the author's name, as logically for a child, it was a storybook she was holding and only the story inside the book seemed important to her. the story was about a boy and his family and the world that surrounded him . he did not believe in magic and one day, he lay awake to find out that after midnight the clock in the tower struck thirteen times, suddenly everything changed all around him and he was filled with a mesmerizing sense of charm and magic all around him. i remember the cover vividly too. it was a figure of the boy in pale blue against the dark night sky with a barn in the background and a clocktower where the hands of the clock was showing 13, studded with a sheen of stars giving it a haunting look.
i never came across this book ever in my life and in my sheer excitement of wanting to share the magic with my classmates i had eagerly traded the book with some other fantasy tale. that was my first taste of magic, without a magician, without a wand or even a spell book... but it haunts me even today. The melodrama queen of hopes and foolish dreams that i am, still believe that this same magic which struck me at such a young age, brings me back that book some day. i would love to read through it again. we tend to forget many things in life, good memories we keep and disturbing ones we force back to the back of our heads. this is one memory which will stay with me forever. its a direct link to my childhood. i want to be awake too when the clock strikes thirteen the next time.
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