Follow your dreams

August 1

INVITED to a dinner at a posh hotel, to meet a group of senior bureaucrats from a neighbouring State. As transport had been provided for me, I arrived a bit early, and was standing near the reception when the other invitees arrived.

The first arrival, on being introduced, asked me if I was the owner of the hotel.

The second arrival shook my hand vigorously, then proclaimed, "Yes, of course, I've read your book - No Full Stops in India!"

"That was Mark Tully," I said. "He smokes a pipe."

The third or fourth arrival got it right, but spoilt it all by asking, "Do you still write, Mr. Bond?"

This is like asking a chef if he still makes soup, or a cobbler if he can repair a shoe. I couldn't be bothered answering his question, but a little boy came to my rescue by asking me to sign my latest book.

* * *

NEVERTHELESS, the question lingers and sometimes I ask myself: Did I find my dream - the dream of 45 years ago? Do I remember that dream?

Most of it, I do believe.

To live independently as a full-time writer; that was part of the dream. And I have done that for most of my adult life. No riches, no houses, no cars, no computers. But independence, certainly.

To live in the place of my choice.

While I was toiling away in Delhi in the early 1960s, I decided I was going to live in the hills and work from there. Just as, five years earlier, I had decided that home was India and not England.

Mussoorie may not have been the perfect choice (there are places more lovely), but in many ways it has suited me. I'm near the Doon (familiar territory), not too far from Delhi (and my publishers), and just a short walk into the solitude of the mountains.

I have lived with the family and companions of my choice - Prem and his children and grandchildren, and many good people on the hillside who have been generous to me over the years.

And have I won the time for leisure, books, nature, love and friendship? Yes, most of these things, for some of the time. Not everything falls neatly into place. How can it? But I think I've done most of what I set out to do. I could have done it a little better, and perhaps there's time to do more. My faults and limitations are many, but I've always accepted that I'm a most imperfect specimen of humanity, which means I've always been on friendly terms with myself!

And yes, Sir, I'm still doing my thing - cobbling shoes, making a tolerable soup, and recording my life and the life around me to the best of my ability.

August 5

TALKING of hotels - most of them, big or small, have one thing in common: the occasional guest who makes off with the linen, the cutlery, and sometimes even a TV set.

Nandu (of the Savoy) tells of how one customer drove off with a mattress rolled up on the luggage rack. When the manager realised what had happened, he phoned the police at the toll-barrier, and they stopped the car and took possession of the mattress. The owner of the car promptly blamed his driver for the theft, but the driver responded - "Sir, you asked me to pick up two mattresses, and now you are blaming me for stealing one!"

Of course there are some tourists who leave their belongings behind; or if not their belongings, their fellow-travellers. The day after a group of jolly, beer-guzzling young men vacated their room, the housekeeper opened a cupboard to have a dead body tumble out on top of her. In a different hotel, a box-bed was found stuffed with a decaying corpse. Both cases went unsolved. Equally enterprising were the young men from Haryana who stabbed to death one of their companions and left the body in the Landour cemetery. But these gentlemen left so many clues behind that they were caught a few days later.

Hill-stations are, by and large, peaceful places, but just occasionally crime rears its ugly head and an old lady is found strangled in her bed or a failed businessman is found hanging in the bathroom.

We won't dwell on these tragedies but think instead of the thousands who come here in high spirits and go away in even better spirits - the combination of clean mountain air, breath- taking scenery, and, just occasionally, spirits of the bottled variety having done wonders for their outlook on life.

* * *

TO me, flowers are the most sensual of living things, or perhaps it's just that the appeal to the sensuality of my own nature. A rose in bud, the heady scent of jasmine, the unfolding of a lily, the flaunting colours of dahlias and giant marigolds, the seductive fragrance of the honeysuckle, all these excite and entice me.

A wild species of geranium (the round-leaved cransebill, to give its English name) with a tiny lilac flower, has responded to my overtures, making a great display in a tub where I encouraged it to spread. Never one to spurn a gesture of friendship, I have given it the freedom of the shady back verandah. Let it be my flower of the month, this rainy August.

RUSKINBOND

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