The Forever Years

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Hailing from Uttar Pradesh, and having studied in Navodaya Vidyalaya, Vivek is a Brand consultant with an inclination for writing and direction. Prior to The Forever Years, he has published Love, Me & Bullshit! (2012), and To Catch a Butterfly (2011). He currently lives in Mumbai.

I grew up in a government-funded boarding school and all boarding schools are a world unto themselves, leaving a lasting impact on its inhabitants. Mine was no different. It always figured in my stories and in my behavioural traits, many of which were in contrast with the general behavioural norms.

But as I drifted away from my origins, these stories began to look incredulous to those around me and unbelievable to a few. It was also the time where I was struggling with an identity crisis. Back in the boarding school, an identity was neither needed nor desired, but the outside world was different. Either you get one for yourself or the world will attribute one to you. And I wasn't comfortable with the associations and attributes being ascribed to me, and needed to create one that I would be more at home with. Thus came the idea of chronicling the stories of childhood, many of which I anyway shared with those around me at times. Their response told me that the stories were good and desirable, and created an impression of me that I was more at ease with.

But the mere intention to chronicle the past wasn't translating into fruitful output. These were not the stories that find expressions in popular narratives, so a literary reference was not available. The life I was leading had no connection left with the world of boarding school, making it distant and inscrutable. It was only when I decisively moved out of my corporate existence, about six years after I first thought of chronicling these stories, that I was able to find a suitable expression. What followed was a ten-year long process, excruciating, but also liberating and transforming, resulting in The Forever Years. It is not a boarding school story but a tale of childhood, and tales are not true or pleasant but they are real, not supposed to be read but to be experienced.

**Contents and Sample Pages**