Two days ago, I changed my desktop wallpaper to Sachin raising his bat. And, yesterday he announced his retirement from Test cricket. Was wondering if I was given a divine signal. I was relieved to know that there are two more games to go for us to watch him play; to watch him mesmerize the nation; to watch him do what he has been doing during my entire life, almost.
Number of headlines - God Bye; India will never be the same again; etc and a number of articles are/will be written. What can one write about this man that's not written before? I can think really deep and hard to find new words to define him or can just simply put what he meant to me and probably the entire generation that grew with me. I think he meant cricket for us. He was the reason we started watching cricket. He, still, is the only reason for many of us to watch this sport. He was the reason that this sport became a religion - a religion much stronger than many others in this country.
Remembering my childhood days (I was probably 8 or 9), Dad would come home and watch India vs South Africa late in the night. Pretending to sleep, I would peep out of my quilt to watch the match and esp. watch him bat. The moment he was out, Dad would angrily switch off the TV, saying "we lost the game". Probably that's when the obsession started. And now when he is about to play his last few innings, more than two decades have gone by. The obsession has evolved into deep reverence and admiration for a guy who stood up every time he was written off. A guy who proved that passion, commitment and determination can make anything possible.
Initially I used to wonder what's so special about him. Now I know what's so special about him. In a country of more than a billion people, we all had our share of issues and failure. We all had this desire of beating the odds sometimes in our lives and he was our alter-ego. Watching him play and dominate the world gave us the hope and inspiration that we typically lacked every time we had failed. He also gave us joy and excitement whenever we succeeded.
It's like I can really map all key stages in my life with Sachin's career. There are those special moments in my life and they all have some connection with an inning or phase of his career. I can go down the memory lane and mark his innings that define stages in my life; but that's a cherished part of my life.
(Image quality is not great, but I am sure we all can relate to this image)
What hurts me is the most when people try to define him by numbers. The only number I would bring up is 24 years. A man of 40 years has played for this country for 24 continuous years and has lived with the burden of so many expectations. And how gracefully he has done it. No one, I really mean no one, can even match his grace, demeanor and humility. For a man as powerful as him (powerful because, no other individual has ruled 1 billion + people in the world as he did), he was always the guy who thanked his GOD for his achievements while he knew that he is the GOD for many of us.
There are too many thoughts running in my mind. Don't think all of them can be penned down. Would end up saying - he is the only person whom I didn't know and yet defined me as a person and the way I am.
Thanks Sachin Tendulkar!! Thanks for being there!!
