The difference between necessity and luxury.There was a time when hearing a song was a matter of luxury.A half an hour weekly episode on doordarshan or a Saturday night movie that might showcase your favorite song was considered a luxury. If you are privileged enough to have a BPL or Videocon TV and an uninterrupted power supply, you were lucky enough to enjoy this weekly luxury. The era where the entire building or society used to throng at one person’s place with snacks prepared at their respective homes, and enjoy the serials and movies together.If not TV, then radio came as another option to enjoy one’s evening or weekends.Aap ki farmaish on vividh bharti kept the hopes high of hearing ones favourite song.Someone,somewhere in the farthest corner of this country might request that song you are waiting for. Or you might overcome your hesitation and send a song request letter to vividh bharti. Again a matter of luck it used to be, your letter getting selected and your request being fulfilled. In those times, not everyone had the luxury to own a gramophone or a record player.Getting a record as a gift seemed like a long cherised dream come true. I remember, our nanaji used to have a collection of records and during the summer vacations, the kids of the house shaked a leg hearing those classics. We used to wait for the summer vacations to enjoy this luxury. Then came the era of cassette players and tape recorders. Vcrs were a matter of prestige in the middle class homes, where one used to hire a casette and play a song or movie, especially during weekends or a family function. The fights and quarrels regarding the choice of a movie tape made memories people cherish till date.Yet it was not easy for everyone to keep buying casettes even if one was lucky enough to buy a tape recorder or a vcr. Friends used to contribute and buy or rent a tape or cassette and circulate the same between them. The excitement to get thar cassette after a long wait is something I yearn for. That kind of thrill, joy and contentment seems missing these days.Funny yet scary situations where the tape of the cassette stuck in the player abd the frantic search of a pen or a stick to rewind it back to the reel. It is a nostalgia I wish to revisit often. When computers came, and the era of cd players, things changed to a great extent.It became easier to access songs and with the advent of the internet, listening to those songs anytime, became an easy task. Yet downloading those songs and keeping them in the system was not yet a reality. With the advent of mobile phones and apps this became more and mor easy and now everyone had the availably and a feasibility to one’s favorite movies , songs and serials at the click of a button. Eventually, people stopped yearning for their favorite song or movie so much. Everything became a matter of on the go entertainment. Time crunch and long hours in travel to and fro from work sucked the joy out of these little things.Social media platforms made this thing even more common and with time ppl stopped yearning for these things.Everything became available not just at the click of a button but also came uncallex for from everywhere, even without asking for it.This became an overdose with time. The essence and joy of it faded completely.Too much of everything makes it’s worth lower with time. And now the time has come when the world came to a halt for whatever reasons,acceptable or unacceptable to us.Yet one little thing happened for the good.It took us back to those old times in some way.We realized the importance of little things and the need to be happy with life’s small offerings. We started cherishing and sharing little moments.In the incessant chase to grab more and more of everything, we have lost the joy in enjoying anything. The greed has disconnected from our real friends and people who are close to us. We have forgotten the basics of life in many ways.I hope we realise this soon and start enjoying our life by sharing and valuing the little things and moments.
musing : necessity : luxury
Tulip Brook 