Today I walked into a bookstore with no real plan. I was just killing time, wandering between shelves, when a familiar cover stopped me mid-step. Electronics For You. I hadn't thought about that magazine in years, maybe decades, but there it was, sitting quietly like it had never left.
Back in school and college, I was a devoted reader of it. Not the kind who casually flipped pages, but the kind who waited for the next issue like it mattered. Every month, when a new edition came out, I would walk to the public library just to read it. No shortcuts, no excuses. At some point during those walks, I made a promise to myself. I remember it clearly now. I told my future self that one day I would subscribe to it, so I wouldn't have to travel just to read a magazine I loved.
Somewhere along the way, that promise got lost.
When I moved to Bangalore, life picked up speed. Career, work, deadlines, and the general noise of adult responsibility took over. Reading didn't stop, but it moved online. Articles, blogs, forums, endless tabs. Efficient, fast, and forgettable. The magazine quietly disappeared from my life, and with it, that version of me who waited eagerly for each new issue.
What's funny is that I didn't remember the promise at all. Not consciously. But the moment I saw that cover, everything came rushing back. The library walks, the excitement, the younger me who thought about the future with a mix of hope and certainty. It's strange how the mind works. Some objects are not just objects; they are triggers. They unlock memories you didn't even know were still there.
Of course, I bought the magazine.
Reading it now feels different. The content has changed, and so have I, but the feeling is unmistakable. There's a quiet satisfaction in holding it, in knowing that I didn't completely abandon that curious kid. In a small, almost insignificant way, I feel like I made it. Not in a grand, dramatic sense, but enough.
I imagine my younger self looking at me and nodding, maybe with approval, maybe just with relief. There's a quote I once heard that feels especially true today:
You only really need to prove yourself to two people, the eight-year-old you and the eighty-year-old you. Everyone else is secondary.
This magazine isn't just paper and print. It's a tiny lost joy I didn't know I was missing, patiently waiting on a shelf to be found again.