Paatya!

Pats and I first met in 1979, when we were 10, scrawny kids who didn’t know crap from dung. I was a shy introverted kid in a new school and he was this studious, friendly chap who would seemingly go out of his way to help others. We both were Einstein House boys in school, so we ended up hanging out a lot more during sports and other events. The cynic in me always thought it can’t be all this good. As time wore on, I ate my words of course, because he was all that and a lot more that I could ever know. He made friends organically, everywhere he went and I was forever in amazement of how he did it with such ease. School days were over in a blink and we kinda lost touch for a few years during the formative years. Those were days of landline phones, devoid of social media, and we all had our own trips to go on and screwups to clean. Late into our twenties, it was wedding season for almost all of our batchmates, and we hung out a lot more, mostly talking about outdoorsy stuff and fitness. Hiking and being in the mountains were common passions we shared. About this time Mugdha, his lovely wife who is one of my most favorite people, had joined TCS and then it seemed like a whole new world of trekking in the sahyadris had opened up for us. Almost every weekend was spent in the countryside, and the weeks were spent in planning about them. He never smoked or drank alcohol and had given up meat very early on… didn’t even swear explicitly and we teased him mercilessly about not having any of these “small vices”. He would always laugh it off loudly. Pats had an insatiable appetite for all kinds of data, which he would then narrate while chugging along on our hikes in microscopic detail, while we would be breathless, huffing and puffing, barely nodding. Those were really the best of times. We did some fantastic high-altitude expeditions together in Nepal and man what a high that was!! He was a strong technical climber and having a data driven partner like him, was a real asset. Pats was a star athlete and a sprinter in school but he moved on to long distance running with time. Past few years he had moved on to endurance cycling and we are talking insane distances here. Plus, life had caught up with him like many of us. He had taken up a teaching job which I’m sure he was brilliant at, and landscape architecture which was his primary occupation, was also keeping him very busy. He would call once in a while and then there would be these endless conversations. Past few years we probably spoke and met a shade less often, than we used to and should have. But he was, I’m sure, always trying to help someone in strife. That was his drug! The best part in all of this was that Pats actually gave his time without expectations, in this time starved city. It’s been forty-five years and more since we first met... That’s more than anyone I know outside my family. And now suddenly he’s gone! The shock of his passing has now somewhat faded and all that’s left behind is a painful numbness which is hanging inside my brain like a stubborn winter haze. I lost more than a friend last Saturday…. I lost a part of me too! Adios my Friend! See you on the other side!