Time Limit

“Translation of a short story written in Assamese by doyen of Assamese creative literature Saurav Kumar Chaliha. The story was titled as “Samay Seema” in Assamese which translates to “Time Limit”

The cold’s setting in, that’s why I’m wearing the suit, I’d also decided on the freshly ironed shirt too – wearing it now – and just as I take the lozenge patterned maroon tie to put it on, I see that the uppermost button’s missing, the one below it too. What now? If I use a pin instead of a button, it’ll look shabby, no, not presentable at all. Let me wear the blue striped shirt then- but that won’t go with the tie, won’t match at all. Right, it is my fault. When I sent the clothes for laundry, I did see the button dangling on the last piece of thread. Thought of telling Dipi to sew it when I saw it – but didn’t. Ah – my mind won’t rest until I’ve shouted at someone. Keeping this in mind, I screamed at my better half – “Dipi, Dipi, are you listening? You had seen the loose button, but didn’t stitch it, now look what happened – I’m about to go out for dinner – no, you never care about the important things –”

She is already checking the buttons on the other shirt and complaining, “Oh, so now it’s my fault? You never have the patience to open the buttons properly, always tugging in a rush. Of course, they will come off if you pull them like that – you know that the collar button always comes loose when the washerman scrubs it, but you’ll never tell me on time – now suddenly it’s my fault that the buttons are missing. You put off everything till the last moment, always, you notice what’s gone only when you need it. Now you’re putting the blame on me –”

“Alright then”, I said, humbling down a bit, “who was blaming you, I was only saying about the problem –”

“Have I created the problem now, you are the one who did – anyway, here, wear this and, what will you do –”

That’s what I did. Well, during dinner, I never felt that somebody paid attention to my choice of clothing or thought that I arrived in unpresentable clothes. Soon enough, I was drawn into the small talk, the slow drift of words across the table and the imperfections of my shirt or tie, simply slipped away from my mind (one of the finer things about men – they hardly care about what the other’s wearing. Let’s take the Baruahs for example – suppose I meet them for five minutes today. By tomorrow, Mr. Baruah wouldn’t even remember what we had on. However, if I were to ask Mrs. Baruah the same after a week, she will accurately list down what me and my wife donned.) The actions of the people of this “centre”¹ are heebie-jeebie and disorganized, there is nothing organized and there’s not even an inkling of any environment that’s soothing to the eyes, but today, in the name of this annual dinner somebody had made some small but neat and methodical decorations to the two small rooms (by opening the middle door), put tube lights here and there, connected the tables and spread long white drapes on them – just like the expensive hotels have their tables arranged, the ones

who remain disheveled throughout the year are also looking clean and decently dressed, the ones who usually wear torn up chappals are wearing polished shoes and sandals(one of them has even put a rose in a buttonhole of his coat), the ones who usually have sullen faces are today at least forcing out a smile, there are only a few girls and women, but the ones who have come to the dinner have arrived as if they were going to a wedding – I thought Dipi would’ve liked it had she come, but from the last two days she’s been down with a cold and feeling weak, along with that her old migraine is acting up, even after me urging her to accompany me to the party, she didn’t want to. By the time we had our dinner, the decisions which had been taken during the first half of the event by the managing committee came up, but the thing is that during this annual dinner, everybody paid attention to the food – the pudding’s nice, ice cream’s also great – towards the end, for the interested ones, high duty imported brandy was made available (most probably Cognac), Turkish coffee… after a sumptuous meal, I left the club. The plight of the ‘Centre for Dramatic Art’ is not that great, but sometimes they offer half-yearly acting programmes to interested students, they present three plays in a year, put in experimental efforts to present new forms of acting, sometimes they organize discussion sessions among themselves. The workers of the club are amateurs (they have other jobs through which they earn their living), but are deeply interested in drama—the centre is the result of that. Even the actors and actresses are amateurs, they do not demand any payment and are content with whatever they receive if sometimes their luck turns—but there’s the house rent, stage rent, the costs of decorating the stage, expenses for technical help and they often face losses in almost every play because of the lack of a sensible audience—yet, due to their indomitable spirit, the centre keeps running. I too once had a dream of being a playwright (I did write a few short plays once, some village youth organizations even staged them), but that dream remained mostly unfulfilled (though somewhere inside me a flicker of hope still lives), I became the area manager of Jupiter Cooperative Credit Bank and that’s how I came into contact with this centre. Institutions like these don’t get loans easily, but after talking with the organizers I realized they were genuine enthusiasts of drama, their interests were aligned with mine, they wanted to do a lot but were held back by their lack of business sense, honest people, without double-facedness—I arranged loans for them on easy terms and allowed flexible repayment, which has helped them to somehow survive. They made me an honorary member of the directorial committee of the club. At the end of every year, the committee organizes a meeting where they discuss and plan the work for the coming year, sometimes I chip in one or two pieces of advice, nothing significant, I listen to the discussions, sometimes I share my opinions. After that, to conclude the working year on a satisfactory note, they organize a dinner, and even within their limited means they manage it properly, putting in whatever they have, even if it leaves them as paupers (which can be termed as going in voluntary liquidation).

In today’s meeting, the committee has decided to include two more subjects in the curriculum, two members of the club would be sent for training: Atul Bharadwaj to Kolkata and Motiur Rahman to Mumbai, they’ll stage at least three plays, one written by Arupa Dihingia which is an experimental psychological play, the other Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House or Pirandello’s Henry IV, and the third one Molière’s The Miser. I had been tasked by the directorial committee to write two short notes on Henrik Ibsen and Molière, but due to procrastination as well as the pressure of other work, I couldn’t prepare the assigned part and went there empty-handed; during dinner, Motiur sat beside me and said, “Dada², why do you always keep postponing work till the last moment? We’re disappointed. Looks like by the time you hand us those write-ups, we’ll already be done presenting Ibsen’s play on stage. I can almost hear you then saying: Umm, brother, I haven’t finished the write-up yet, a lot of problems came up, didn’t get any free time to focus on this… heh heh – no, your excuses won’t be enough this time, you start writing tomorrow itself, so that we can release the brochure in good time –” “Ok, ok,” I said, to wrap up the discussion, “everything will happen in good time, but let’s have a good time right now – this ice cream is really delicious, isn’t it? Here, take some more –”

After being satisfied with the dinner, I lit up a cigarette of contentment, loosened my tie and started heading home with slow steps (home’s nearby, walking will make me feel good). Motiur is right, postponing things till the last moment is not good – but the main problem is that I don’t have the drive and energy left in me like in my earlier years, I’m getting old (many of my contemporaries have already retired, some have passed away, some are bedridden), I no longer feel vigorous, along with that, ailments of old age have started appearing, diabetes, blood pressure, cataract in the eyes, problems with the prostate, and apart from these the usual yearly flu, cough and cold, bronchitis, viral fever – my friend Dr. Baruah recommended me a vitamin supplement (according to him, medicines like these are mandatory at old age), he said the supplement is full of a multitude of vitamins, antioxidants, enzymes and so on, somehow I need to take two spoonfuls of the medicine twice a day, only then will my health barely keep up with life’s demands. But due to laziness, I often miss taking this life-saving medicine on time, but still I’m functioning properly – nah, when do I ever follow rules to the letter – when will I bring everything in order, when will I set the futures of Dipa and Dipu on a satisfactory track… when will I finish writing the play of my dreams –

After reaching home, I see that it’s dark, the streetlamp’s also not working, the entire lane covered in a shroud of darkness—in essence, there’s a power cut. In a neighbour’s house, a couple of lights were glowing from an inverter; through the windows of my own home, I could see a faint flicker of light. By mistake, I pressed the doorbell—it didn’t ring. I knocked on the door and started calling my better half, “Dipi, Dipi, open the door.” Dipi came up in a half-asleep state and opened it. “Why are you so late?” Dipi accused me in a squeezing tone. “I waited for you for so long that I fell asleep.” I saw that a tiny piece of candle was lit on the table in the living room, a rug half-open on the sofa. After taking off my coat, I said, a bit impassively, “This was the final dinner of the club, people meet each other, it gets a little late – by the way, how long has it been since the power was cut?” Dipi took the coat and the tie from my hand and said, “You already know that there’s a power cut every night, you know that I’m all by myself, I get scared in the dark – you came spending a jolly time with your buddies, eating fish and meat, and here I was struggling to cook and heat the food, you never understand these problems –” “Aah, why won’t I understand,” I said, trying to sound modest, “that’s why I rushed home as soon as I could, even before the party ended – by the way, did you have dinner?” “I ate somehow, nothing special, and then the power went off – I couldn’t even find the matchbox, somehow after a lot of fumbling I found it on the kitchen shelf, but it was almost empty, had only three matchsticks left, and there were no candles either, now there’s only one matchstick left – how many days I’ve been telling you to bring a dozen matchboxes, and candles too, the gas lighter has worn out, that also you never repair, every night the power goes off when it’s needed the most, but you never care about what I say –” “Why,” I asked, interrupting her, “had you switched on the inverter—” And I fell silent, ashamed, because the inverter had been dead for quite a few days, Dipi had been reminding me again and again, and I’d been postponing it as usual, saying I’d get it done, but even this time, just like always, I— “Oh, now you remember about the inverter – Lord, it must be my good fortune that you remembered at all! Well, no need to take the matter ahead, quickly freshen up and go to sleep, the remaining piece of candle is about to finish, there’s no more candle left, and who knows when the electricity will return –” I tried to interject, “Why, the torch –” and again I had to face the harsh reality of my stupid habit of procrastination (the batteries of the torch were finished, Dipi had asked me to buy replacements repeatedly, but I…), so I quickly tried to change the subject and said, “Right, now let’s sleep then –” Dipi picked up the almost extinguished candle and followed me to the bedroom. I understood that she had been waiting all this while to ask about one thing, so she changed her tone from accusatory to gentle and said, “What food was served in the dinner party?”

By the way, in the unaccustomed darkness, I kept tossing on the bed for quite some time (usually a dim light keeps glowing and some light from the streetlamp filters through the drapes). It came to my mind that I’d seen a piece of candle on Dipa’s study table, but now in the matchbox in the kitchen there’s only one matchstick left – by the way, my own matchbox is there beside the cigarette pack, but what will I do by lighting it up—came to the realization that the house feels empty without Dipa (the sound of her coughing, the little noises she makes while sleeping). She isn’t a bright student, didn’t do well in her half-yearly exams, somehow passed due to grace marks. She spent two days crying over her poor results, after that her younger maternal aunt, seeing her plight, took her along to spend some days with her children, thinking a change of place might help. We really have been neglecting the fact that Dipa has been inattentive to her studies, poor thing is already dull and nowadays tuitions are quite useless for the average students (teachers cutting corners in teaching)—except for the sharp-minded students. Besides, classes in school are rarely held, the teachers more focused on their private tutorials since they don’t receive their salaries month after month, exams delayed, results delayed—nah, I can’t let things go on like this anymore. If I don’t think properly about her future now, then when will I think? Whoever has seen the bad state of schools and colleges has sent their children elsewhere. From our neighbourhood, the electricity board’s SDO, Jogen Dutta, sent his daughter to a school at Udaynagar when she was in class six—excellent discipline, wonderful hostel facilities, safe and secure. After hearing his advice, we too decided to send Dipa to that school (since she’d have Jogen Dutta’s daughter there as a company). Dutta himself made the effort to arrange the forms for us; we’ll submit the form this session and—feeling excited, I sat up on my bed—the last date of submission is the upcoming 25th, oh God, there’s no time at all, such a nick of time—had I postponed this too till the last moment—pshaw, how irresponsible—no, tomorrow morning itself I’ll have to fill up the form anyhow, tomorrow I’ll send it by speed post—

I felt some relief after making this firm decision—right, I should also not ignore Dipu and his affairs anymore—he’s finished a computer course and gone to Delhi for a job interview, well, before settling into a stable career, he wishes to complete an MBA degree—alright, let’s see what opportunity he finds in Delhi—but the first thing tomorrow morning will be Dipa’s application… keeping that in my mind, I slept.

Next morning, I woke up and saw that the weather’s pleasantly sunny. Dipi kept my cup of morning tea on the bedside table; she placed my matchbox there too and said, “I kept some matchsticks in the kitchen, but you bring me a few packets of candles and matchsticks after breakfast – otherwise you won’t remember later –” Taking a sip of tea made my mind feel good, I said playfully, “Ok then – and you might need a gas cylinder too?”

“Gas? Enough, you don’t need to pretend to be the responsible husband early in the morning – remember how ashamed you made me in front of the Borpujaris because of the gas cylinder?” Saying this, Dipi went out.

I also realized that I shouldn’t have tried to make fun of the situation, because what happened then was indeed my fault. We had invited Mrs. Borpujari for evening tea, Dipi had prepared some lucis³; after cooking the aloo bhaji and thinking she would heat the lucis a bit, the gas cylinder suddenly got exhausted. Somehow Dipi lit up the standby Janata kerosene stove—there was very little kerosene, the wick wouldn’t glow properly—still she somehow managed to fry the lucis while all that time the guests sat waiting with only the fried potatoes on their plates.

Once the guests left, Dipi gave me an earful. For two days she had been saying the cylinder looked almost empty and that I should call the gas agency for a refill. I hadn’t paid much attention to it. The fault was mine; I kept quiet and digested Dipi’s rebukes (what else could I have done!).

Finishing the cup of tea, I got down from the bed and thought, no, I can’t postpone everything till the last moment and get humiliated every time, if I keep putting things off like this, time will slip out of my hands and life will end—just as it happens when the gas, the shoelace, the coat button, the torch batteries, the matchbox, the candles, the ink, the tea leaves, the headache curing tablets all run out one by one. I know my beard isn’t properly shaved by the old blunt blade, yet out of procrastination I never buy a new one, always forgetting, until the day comes when I have to catch a train and I try to shave my two day old beard with that same dull razor—and at night, when I’m just getting interested reading something while lying in bed, that’s when I remember the reading lamp’s bulb has fused… if I keep repeating life like this, one day the bulb of life itself might suddenly go out –

No, no, I shouldn’t let negative and disappointing thoughts take hold of my mind – if the bulb is about to fuse, then it’s better to fit a new one right away and keep the old as a spare. Right, I should do that. Sharirang Aadyang Khalu Dharmasadhanang ⁴– our sages had indeed said some wonderful things over time. Yes, I should focus on keeping my body functional. Alright, today itself I’ll start taking the elixir Dr. Baruah prescribed me. With a satisfied mind, I had my breakfast, and after that went to the corner shop – the little gumti ⁵– and bought candles and matchboxes for Dipi. Then I came home and sat in the verandah. A pleasant sunshine was falling on the balcony. I brought out Dipa’s application forms, filled in as much as I could, and told Dipi, “Hey, I’ll submit these documents once the post office opens and send them by speed post, but before that a couple of Dipa’s signatures will be required. You call sister-in-law and inform her that I’m about to head to their place, and to make sure that Dipa doesn’t go out somewhere –”

Dipi thought for a moment and said, “Eh, will you send it today itself –” Dipi didn’t want to let Dipa live by herself away from home; she’s not too smart either. I said, “Yes, I’ll need to send it today itself, you know that the 25th is the last date, you’ll have to strengthen your will –”

Dipi thought again, then said, “Alright, I’ll call my sister, you get ready –”

“That’s that then,” I thought, I won’t postpone things anymore. After returning from the post office, I’ll start working on my unwritten play. I remember telling my friend Munin Bayan — who was also an aficionado of plays — about the ones I was planning to write. He had said they would turn out wonderfully and often reminded me that instead of procrastinating, I should begin them at once, with firm resolve. He had also given me some advice: “If your mind isn’t steady enough to make that resolution, come, let’s collaborate and start the write-up. You keep writing, I’ll keep editing, keep giving suggestions — let’s aim for one page daily, what do you say?”

“Wonderful idea,” I said, “it would be great.” “Yes, let’s do that—” but before I could truly begin down that path, one day, suddenly, Munin Bayan passed away.

I should start the write-up before the bulb of my life fuses out — daily, at least half an act, at least one page — it can be done. The play of my dreams will inspire the play of my life to move forward. Shakespeare had already said: “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women are merely players…” One must experience life fully, as long as all five senses are still awake. Just like the “Centre for Dramatic Art,” which, despite its hardships and constant shortages, still celebrates the year’s end with a grand dinner and prepares itself for another beginning — as if their motto is, “eat ghee even if you must borrow it” — yes, that’s the real dramatic art of life.

Okay then, now let me smoke one cigarette. After that, I’ll take two spoons of Dr. Baruah’s life-saving vitamin, and then I’ll go to meet Dipa to get the papers signed. I checked my pocket – it was empty. Pshaw – just as always, the same old story again. I had just come from

the shop, but couldn’t I have remembered that the cigarettes might have finished, that I should have bought a packet? Well, I’ve been repeating the same thing every day – a habit is a habit. No need to feel sad over it; let’s take the medicine instead.

I held the bottle under the sunlight and read the instruction: shake well before use. I shook it vigorously, took a spoon from Dipi, and just as I was about to open the cap, I noticed the expiry date printed on the label. I paused. The medicine had expired two months ago. In essence, the life-saver’s own lifetime had ended two months earlier.

Slowly, I put the bottle down on Dipa’s application papers.

Endnotes

• ¹ Refers to the Centre for Dramatic Art, a local institution with which the narrator is engaged.
• ² A way of referencing to someone older than oneself, an elder brother figure.
• ³ An alternative term used for pooris
• ⁴ Well-known Sanskrit adage from the epic poem Kumarasambhava(Canto 5, Verse 33) by the great ancient Indian poet and playwright Kalidasa. It translates to This body is surely the foremost instrument of doing [noble] deeds
• ⁵ In Assam, the term usually refers to a small shop selling household products and other oddities.