Beautiful Thing

Never in a thousand years had I imagined that she would say that to me. 

We went back quite a long way, and she had always been the most beautiful thing I ever knew. I was hesitant to tell her that though, as I did not know how she would take it. It was just as well, better to be close to her, around her all the time than mess it all up with a moment of uncalled-for bravado. I was ok with that. It seemed for now, that she was too.

And yet here she was, sitting across from me, smiling radiantly as ever. My eyes were still tracing the upward curve of her lips, leading into those perfect cheekbones, before one splashed into her deep blue eyes. She must have seen me distracted because she was saying something again,

"I asked if you are coming for our girls' night-out. It'll be over at Katy's place, so it's practically a slumber party. It's gonna be..."

I must have been nodding along encouragingly. She kept going on about our night together in pajamas...

He suddenly realized he was still holding the phone, and she was still talking. How long had she been going on? What had he missed? Were they still talking about the same thing? What had they been talking about anyway? He tried to remember where he had lost track of the conversation. He started working backwards, with great difficulty, and arrived at a point where it looked like he had lost the plot. She had said something then, and he did not remember it. Something that had jerked him out of the conversation and into another plane. He even remembered thinking to himself, 

"Never in a thousand years had I imagined that she would say that to me"

Oh.

Why the Sehwag double hundred feels different

For that very reason actually. That title sounds so natural. The Sehwag Double Hundred. Because there is a need to brand it. Because there's already one before him. That was the one that was only called 'The Double Hundred'. That deserved the definite article. It was something as yet undefined by anyone, so there was no need to brand it. Like how we just call it 'The Sun'. Not the Walmart Sun, you know?

In a way, it's sort of unfair to Sehwag. After all, this IS the highest score on the planet in ODIs. But, it remains just a refinement of an already accomplished effort. The response to the double hundred itself was distinct. From the crowd, from the commentators, everyone. Compare Ravi Shastri's 'First man on the planet to do it, and it's the Superman from India' to Siva's 'Has he got it through the gap? Is it another four? Oh what a good shot... Oh hang on he's got 200 too!'. I'm exaggerating of course, but the focus itself was not on the 200 anymore but how fast he had got there, how everything had gone right for him etc.

And that's the second part that's been unfair to Sehwag. A lot has been written and said about his see-ball-hit-ball philosophy and his blank mind and everything. It's unconventional yes, but also simple. To the point of being too simple in fact, that it's not exhilarating anymore. When Sehwag reduces it to just two actions, everyone thinks 'oh yes of course, now it all makes sense'. And we all rejoice in how easy it is, and how effortlessly he does it. 

But human inclination is to celebrate the skill that it does not yet understand, and watch a master of the skill perspire his way to it. In all of what I consider Sachin's three greatest innings - vs Australia (the qualifier), Sharjah; vs Pakistan, Centurion; vs South Africa, Gwalior - the most enduring images have been of Sachin puffing/cramping/puffing & cramping. Contrast that to Sehwag's effortless coast to the 200, and then some more. One is a master painstaking working his way to an art, the other is doing a 9-5 job. One is a butcher, the other a sculptor. The act is the same, but the art, not so much.

In many ways, the first double hundred just ran to a perfect script. The 200 didn't come till the last over,. There was the incredulity of whether the country's favourite captain would deny the favourite son just because he was dealing only in boundaries. Surely after coming all the way to 199, where he seemed to stay for about an eternity, he wouldn't be denied for lack of strike! Hashim Amla got perhaps the greatest cheer in an away ground for stopping a boundary. It was a perfect symphony of rising notes leading up to the crescendo. Like Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. Sehwag's innings on the other hand was like Pink Floyd's Echoes. A constant trip where you barely notice the high points, because you just want to keep tripping away...