What do you not have enough of?

I live near the HAL airport in Bangalore. It is used for airforce test flights. Once in a while, some VIP planes will land here. The king and queen of England landed here last month when they were on a private visit to Bengaluru.

Living near the airport means there’s a lot of cool planes that I get to see regularly. Every day there is thunder in the sky. The loud sound is meditative. It jolts me from whatever I am doing and brings me back to the present. You can’t hear another person when a plane flies by. In a weird way, the loud sound brings some quiet. I don’t know if they are especially loud because they are fast military jets or because they are flying so low. 

Every time I hear the sound, I automatically, crane my neck to see where the plane is. I haven’t yet understood the science behind the sound and sight of planes. You hear the sound from somewhere and the plane emerges from elsewhere. As a result, I can rarely spot the planes. But when I see one, I feel a certain joy. Every single time. 

Growing up, I rarely saw planes. It was a big deal when a plane flew over our building. “I could see the windows,” was a common exaggeration in school days. 

My son and his friends aren’t as excited though. They seem used to it. 

I think we keep noticing things that we don’t have and things that others have more of - money, power, confidence, charm, etc.

“He’s so confident!”.

“She is so knowledgeable!”

“He is filthy rich!”

When you have enough of these, you don’t notice it. You aren’t impressed easily by big houses, powerful bosses, rich seths, bear with me, or supersonic jets. Your relationship with money, power, and other such things gets defined when you don’t have a lot of it. Even if you acquire a lot of these later in life, it is difficult to change your ways. There is a reason the world judges the nouveau riche.

I wonder if these kids judge me. Afterall, I am a newly rich person when it comes to plane spotting. I have never seen so many planes from so close. But to be honest, I hope I don’t get used to it. And I hope I don’t judge someone else who gets excited about something so marvellous.