How to rekindle an old flame

You are not Zimbabwe.

You can play.

You are not Pakistan.

Ask them, they will play with you.

You don’t have to watch back to back one day games, broken players, dead wickets, idiot bowlers, foolish fielders, crowdless games.

You can play.

If you don’t have a bat, beg, borrow, steal. Maybe even buy one.

Not the heaviest or the lightest, or the costliest or the cheapest, but a bat with a reason.

Maybe it’s a faux Sachin bat, with the MRF logo, and the Tendulkar scribble signature.

Maybe it’s heavier than bats are supposed to be.

Maybe you’ll play long enough to pick up one of Tendu’s ailments.

Maybe you’ll feel a connect every time you lift the bat, drive straight or snick one to slips.

Even if there are no slips. You know where they stand.

So, what are you waiting for – an IMF funding, buy the bat. Buy them Cosco balls.

Walk out of the store as if you were opening the batting. Expect people to stare, applaud, buy more bats, create a chain reaction.

Run windmills with the bat. Feel the distance between cricket politics and you increase – to an eternity.

Feel, if you want to play, nobody can stop you. You are not Zimbabwe. You are not Pakistan.

All you need is someone to bowl, someone to bowl to. Cars, walls, evening walkers to field. A driveway or a road. The cranky old black gate. Streaking bikes.

You can play anybody. A chauffer who looks like Chanderpaul, a neighbour who looks like Nasser Hussein, a kid who looks like the nephew. Even the niece.

Because, like Zimbabwe, if the folks let them be, everybody just wants to play.

Because, like Pakistan, even if the roads are unsafe, everybody wants to play.

Because there are no lawns left to play. And there are no safe places left to play.

On Earth, or in the neighbourhood.

And go on, sing Cat Stevens aloud, “where do the children play?”

But before you get too caught up in muddled thought, play.

Play it again, Shyam. Play it again, maan. Play it again.

Play till your t shirt is heavier than your bat. Play till the bat grip is sweatier than your t.

Play till you knock something, and you half expect a grown up to yell, like you were a kid.

Play till you forget what cricket has become.