describe-- de·scribe/diˈskrīb/
Verb:
Give an account in words of (someone or something), including all the relevant characteristics, qualities, or events.
Indicate; denote.
When I began this blog, I wanted to go back to my basics. So, I thought, when was the first time that I described anything? It wasn't my last Facebook update, it wasn't the answers that I wrote for my Teacher Eligibility exams, it surely wasn't the last gossip I had my sister over the last spoonful of Maggi, so when was it?
And then I remembered the first time I was taught how to describe. How to look at an object, study its physical appearance, think about the uses, or applications, observe all its characteristics and write them down in short precise sentences. Form something like a short essay or paragraph.
I was six at that time, long time ago...Mrs. Nayyar, my Malyali Class teacher. The first thing I noticed about her was her hair. Long black lustrous hair that was parted in the middle and tied in a plait that was knotted loosely only towards the bottom. For a Punjabi like me, the only kind of plaits I knew were tight ribboned plaits that literally pulled the hair off your scalp!
My school was a prim and proper Catholic Convent in the heart of a loud and boisterous hinterland of Punjab, India. How the silent, graceful sisters of the Convent survived the romantic cacophony of Ferozepur was anybody's guess. But the moment I stepped into the school premise every morning, life for me became a scene right out of the Abby of Sound of Music, my favourite movie as child.
Just as in every convent, my classroom had three stone walls while the fourth dimension of the room was walled with Glass windows. Each window etched with a beautiful design of a Gothic Cross. I preferred to sit by what we used to call the Window wall row. Second seat generally. It let me take my day dreaming breaks, and once in a while when it would rain, I had the most animated wall next to me!
I never really enjoyed sitting in the front row, it was too intrusive to my privacy. I couldn't doodle, or play-act that I was reading the textbook whereas, I was really just scanning the drawings. And the last row wasn't for me either. Though we were a bunch of six years olds, we had rowdy bullies even then. So, beyond the fourth seat row, lay a territory which I didn't tread at least till I was way in high school. Anyhow, coming back to my first lesson of Description.
It was the third day of school for me I think, English Period, in came Mrs. Nayyar, wearing a deep emerald Saree, hair tied in the same loose plait. As we addressed her with a singsong " Good Morning Maaaam" she smiled and walked towards the left side of the blackboard. Since I was sitting on my favorite second bench in the row next to the window, we were diagonally opposite each other, ma'am and I. And then she taught us for the first time how to describe, how to write a paragraph, which led to how to write picture compositions. The first thing that she taught us how to describe was- a ballpen. Starting from "leave two fingers' space" to how to sum up the paragraph, her method of teaching was fluent and clear. And with this blog, I intend to go back to my basics.
Let us start slow and easy, I will be taking up simple day to day topics and sum it up in 100's...wondering what this means? A picture is worth a thousand words, so I will try and describe photographs and paintings in 1000 words, and other topics in multiples of hundred.
Lets try and make Writing Interesting the Write way!
God Speed!!
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