Coronavirus and Cricket: Love is what makes you wait!

England and West Indies clashed in the first post-covid cricket series. Pic: ICC

"Main nazar se pee raha huu, ye samaa badal na jaye. Tera aane kii khushi mein, mera dam nikal na jaye."

I was singing this Hindi song on the evening of July 8. I am neither a music fan nor romantic; I do not listen to or read poetry, if that is what you got from the couplet. 

My happiness owed to Kemar Roach, a West-Indies cricketer, running in to bowl for the first time after the longest break in the international cricket in recent history. 

Wreaking havoc across the globe, the novel Coronavirus forced sports enthusiasts to contend with watching highlights. If you wonder why am I talking about a game while the world has bigger problems, let me ask you this: What matters to you the most? I am sure common answers will be parents or friends, or anything you love. And that is it: Love is love, and love is what matters the most.

A pandemic, no doubt, offers complications. For me, too, several other things made life tougher. Not aiming to bore you with the obvious details about how dull the lockdown since March has been, I shall stick to my love affair. 

So, finally, I and my love (read cricket) were having a treat, with an interesting season having just started. We were starting to enjoy ourselves, again, the game in the ground and I in front of a screen before a ‘villain’ knocked on our door. At first, we were not troubled, knowing almost no love story is perfect. Separation, sadness, and severe pain are a part of all romance. 

But the villain wasn't an Amrish Puri from the mid-‘90s Bollywood, who could make you try, cry, fly but never die. This was something unforeseen, its barricades stronger than anything else in the world. There was no way out. It seemed to be the end. But can anything end until it ends? My love was unshackled, as was the smile on my face. 

As we were reunited, my beloved whispered to me: “Dear, oh, dear! Love is what makes you wait!"