Days of Yore

Size DOES Matter) and pray that none of your accomplices is wearing Shalwar without an underwear (if you know what I mean).

However, this was the ideal scenario. Usually what normally happened was that as soon as you set up the movie one of your family members presses the doorbell as he had forgotten something and had to come back to pick it up. Now there is chaos. At first you don’t know what to do. You look at your accomplices for help but find them looking up to you to act on the contingency plan. Your mind becomes numb. Different images start to form before your eyes: you see yourself as the actor (or actress) on the receiving end in the movie with different family members, as protagonists, taking turns assaulting you (if you know what I mean). The bell rings again and you are back from your nightmare. Your mind starts to work at the speed of light. You ask your friends to take out the film, take it with them and change the cables behind the TV. You make your way to the balcony to see who is there. You see a family member asking you to open the door. You say, “I will be right down”. You then go back in. Take the keys from key holder and throw them at your friends asking them to get out of the house from back door. Then you put the cloth back on the VCR checking that it has not heated up and drain the cool water down the sink. While going downstairs you half un-tuck your shirt putting a few drops of water on your trousers and flush the toilet. Before opening the door you look over your shoulders to make sure that all of your friends have made their way out through the back door. Then you open the door praying to God to save you from being the victim of an assault. Your brother (or father or mother or sister) asks you “what took you so long?” to which you reply that you were in the wash room and rushed out to open the door. The ruffled shirt and water drops on the trousers give credibility to your claim. Whether an Investigator might have accepted the same logic is questionable but your family member (not being inquisitive at this particular moment and his mind on something else) accepts it as he can also hear the faint voice of water re-filling the flush tank.

This, however, is again an ideal scenario. What usually happened was that while coming back from balcony you cannot find the key to back door, or your friends forget to take out the movie, or change the cable, or you spilled water on VCR while picking it up, or your friend can’t fit the key in the lock of back door. These are the events that usually occurred which made watching these movies high risk ventures. It may seem unbelievable but all this happened. Once when the movie was at its climax, the lights went out. Those VCRs were not the VCRs of today that you just touch the button and the cassette came out. You had to make an effort to push the button and the Cassette Holder would pop up. However, since the Cassette was in Play mode, it would not pop up. You had to open the VCR by unscrewing the top cover. Take out few wheels, displace a few circuits and use the screw driver to untangle the reel from some unseen pin. Finally the cassette was out. Now you replace the circuits, the wheels and replace the top cover and screw every thing in place. You are some how happy with yourself when you suddenly realize that you are sitting on a screw or a wheel or a circuit. You just pray that it was an unnecessary part of the VCR and VCR should work perfectly without it. It usually works alright, but you never go near it again, who knows when it might breakdown.

Watching the movie when every body is sleeping was also perilous. I used to watch the movie early morning on a weekend when everyone was sleeping. Once while watching it, my Mom woke up. She asked me “What were you watching?” Thank God I kept my wits and said, “Nothing special: Just the wedding movie of my uncle searching for your prospective daughter-in-law.” She laughed, gave me a slight slap and went to the wash room. Had she asked me to show the prospective bride of her son, she surely would have not liked her attire (just a shoe on her body) or the pose she had made for the camera.

Watching rated movies in those days was precarious. But the contentment that resulted from the amalgamation of thrill, success, fear and ecstasy was much more gratifying and satisfying then the craving and feeling of early ejaculation that is the end result of just visiting an X-rated website or watching endless movies in a cyber café.