Memories a Piece of Paper Brought Back

Memories a Piece of Paper Brought Back

“Some like golden ships
Some like silver ships
I like one ship…
That is friendship.”
Does not sound familiar? You must have written these words in greetings cards on different occasions when you were say 7 or 8 years old. Definitely not after that ! These words must have found a prominent place in the cards you made for your best friend. And that’s how I got these words too. When I was in the std II my friend wrote these words in the New Year Card she made for me. It was the first time I was introduced to this ‘friendly jingle’ and I was full of awe for my friend whom I believed to be a great poet (I was so naïve…). But then I realized that my friend was no great poet because the same day my sister received those words on a card her friend made for her. And so my sister and I began using the rhyme profusely in whatever we wrote. Not anymore. In fact we stopped using it the moment we got the next one! It went like this:
“I don’t like Sunday,
I don’t like Monday,
I like one day,
That is your birthday!”
And that became a regular in every birthday card I made for my friends. But with time these cute little poems got tarnished (due to overuse of course) and I stopped using them. I even stopped making cards “Why should I make one anyway?” was what I thought. Especially when Archie’s or Hall-mark cards were available. So I switched to tailor made cards perfect for any occasion. So did my friends. No more did we have to write the same old symphony (or cacophony?) of ‘I love your birthday’ on cards made out of middle pages torn out from a notebook. By the time I was ten I had stopped this business of making cards for my friends. And each one of us would look forward to New Year and Christmas to buy beautiful cards for each other. My favourite was the one with the baby Jesus in mother Mary’s arms, in a stable with the lambs and three shepherds standing nearby and cute cherubs floating above.
And I would buy something like that for my friend hoping that I would also receive a similar one from her! And we used to be in such a frenzied state buying cards for uncles, aunts, and teachers…
It used to be much fun. Being on the receiving end gave greater pleasure (it’s the same even now) and the joy used to be greater when a card arrived by post, especially if it was addressed to me instead of my father. It made me feel important and I could proudly say,”It’s mine!”
I have a collection of such cards I received on different occasions. There are more than hundred of them I should say, all preserved and kept in a red paper bag. (That it lies in the store room is another matter altogether! ).
The other day as I went to get something from the store room my eyes fell on the red paper bag, full of dust kept on the top most shelf, and I thought it would be fun to go through the mess! I took the bag gingerly from the shelf trying my best not to sneeze ( It was so dusty).
I took out the cards one by one and glanced at them. There were so many that I started rummaging through them as I began to lose patience. Suddenly I spotted a very dirty looking yellowish paper lying twisted disgracefully among the ‘once upon a timeelites’. I took it out carefully and opened its folded ends. It was hand written. It said, “Happy New Year… May your every morning come with new happiness.”
The ‘almost perfect’ grammar and spellings told me that it was at least ten years old. It was a middle page torn out from a small notebook. On the front, the maker had drawn a potted plant with a single stem, a single leaf and a single flower.There was a sun smiling above it too. It was made for me by Ramya, my childhood friend whom I barely remember now. She had given it to me just before I left my school, my home and everything and everyone I knew before I came to Kerala.
And I went on a tour down memory lane. I remembered how we used to play ‘chorsipahi’, ‘blind man’s buff,’ etc, how we used to fight over silly things, how we used to patch up. Waking up from my reverie I turned back the card to find the same old lines written on it:
“Some like golden ships,
Some like silver ships,
I like one ship,
That is friendship.”
And I had to laugh. After all these years of alienation from that lovable rhyme, I was introduced to it all over again!What I found worn out and clinched long ago, now brought a smile to my lips.
This card was the only thing I took back to my room after I put the red bag with all its contents back on the shelf in the store room. The simple card conveyed much more than any other beautiful card in the bag. It brought back memories of bygone days, sweet friendship, and innocence.
That card now rests in the middle page of my personal diary, which is kept among my most prized possessions! And guess what I am thinking after I recovered that card: “Should I gift my friend an Archie’s card on her birthday after all???”

Article By:Veena M.B,St.Teresa's College