Aberration

I've seen the forms of aberration even as a schoolboy. The boy who used to sit by my side in the class had curly hairs and a very fair complexion. I know your reaction, you'd attribute this to their parents or at least one of them had good complexion and curly hairs or both of them. That's not my point. The aberration then has no say. I'm trying to bring home the contrast of the child not taking the quality of their parent or parents. I could see that you shift restlessly and try to establish the reality by pointing to their ancestors if not parents.

They may even be proved scientifically but then aberration still flouts the rules. There's the latent deviation. There's a varied exhibition of human activities. There are the tonal variation and the physical dimensions like height and features. Have we not seen cleft-lipped persons and hunchback people? Nobody likes to have such variations but then the creation of the wholesome bunch of people is not happening, isn't it? It's a law of Nature and to discern them or some of them has taken men the lifetime and even the lifetime of some generations. Well, here we go not attempting to explain why there's a difference in things or men.

It's on the other side of reality. Take for example a family of four members. Leaving the parents their children are seen to exhibit heterogeneous behavior. The dad is submissive and the mother is arrogant whereas the children are neither arrogant nor submissive but elusive. In comparison to a similar family and even the same number of households, I could make out drastic changes. The parents are timid but the children are aggressive. The children herein mentioned are not babies but teenagers. After all, the teenage is a stage and ushering in adulthood and mannerism.

While a majority of the teenagers remain well adapted to their family values and atmosphere, a certain percentage goes astray and indulge in criminal and abominable activities. Even the penitentiary doesn't make them realize and make a man of them. One would account for the changeover in young people pointing to the cultural and social adversaries all over the world. There've been counselling from experienced public figures and psychiatrists. This would perhaps benefit only those in the age groups above thirty or more but not the younger people. Sometimes youngsters indulge in atrocities fully knowing what they're up to.

I'm reminded of a boy long back in my college days. He was with us in the hostel. Those days the hostels of educational institutions were not that comfortable as of today. The facilities were need-based only. Particularly the restrooms were not commensurate with the strength of inmates nor did they afford cleanliness. Once in a day they washed and sanitized but then it's the duty of those users to flush the lavatory every time they visited. This particular boy never cared to flush the lavatory and he hurried away on sighting another guy. Many inmates frowned at entry into the toilet that was left unflushed.

"Some goddamned fellow has left the place untidy, " they'd grouse. It took us several days to pin him up on his stealthy visit as he'd choose to go near the restroom only when others were not around. That's the occasion where people kept him under check. The hostel scenario was sometimes horrible too. There used to be plastic tubs with plastic mugs. Some people never used them as they bathed under the shower. Well, that didn't mean they could leave the tub or mug filled with soiled water apparently the result of soap and shampoo washed down by the shower bathers. Such undesirable actions went uncontrolled as it happened with the seniors. The juniors on their turn of using the bathroom had the unpleasant task of cleaning the bathroom, tub, etc. This the juniors avoided if there was any adjoining room relatively clean enough in a row of bath rooms. But one would be forced to take up the cleaning job if there was a crowd in a queue outside. Another guy I'm reminded of in talking about aberration is Mr. Someone. He was in the hostel along with others. At lunchtime and in the mess the hostellers fidgeted to eat up and proceed to college before the lunch interval was over. The attendants served the food in order and it took some time to come by persons. This sometimes felt really a long time as everyone was busy. This someone at times like this adopted a reverse tactic. He'd pull out the bucket of buttermilk placed near him on the table and pour it to his rice when everyone after a serving of rice waited for sambar to come. That way when others ate butter milk and rice he'd eat sambar and rice and would quickly quit the place. He was a senior guy. It's said he had some family problems. God forbid him for he kicked the bucket in a few years after his graduation.