There was a time when happiness did not require elaborate planning. It came naturally, quietly, and often unexpectedly.
The arrival of the summer holidays was enough to fill us with excitement. Schools would close, and the annual family trip would begin. For many of us, the destination was not a hill station or a beach resort. It was our nanihal, a bhua’s home, a pilgrimage town, or our ancestral hometown. The destination mattered less than the journey itself.
Today’s vacations often begin months in advance. We compare destinations, study hotel reviews, book flights, prepare detailed itineraries, and even ask Artificial Intelligence to help us choose the “best” option. Friends who have already visited become our travel consultants.
There is nothing wrong with this. In fact, technology has made travel easier than ever before. Yet somewhere along the way, many of us have started believing that happiness lies only at the destination.
In those days, the journey itself was the holiday.
Train travel was the heart of every vacation. Reservations were made weeks in advance. Sometimes we even purchased circular railway tickets, which allowed us to visit several places economically, provided we did not pass through the same station twice.
In 1975, along with two other couples, we travelled for exactly one month. We went down the east coast to Kanyakumari, returned through the west coast via Bombay (now Mumbai), and finally reached our hometown, Ranchi. The circular railway ticket for the entire month cost just ₹165 per person.
We remember singing Antakshari with fellow passengers who had been strangers only a few hours earlier. We remember opening our tiffin boxes and sharing homemade food with people from different parts of the country. We remember making new friends before the train reached the next major station. We remember conversations that lasted longer than the journey itself.
There were no mobile phones to keep everyone occupied. No one sat staring at a screen. We looked out of the window, watched rivers, fields and villages pass by, exchanged stories, laughed together and enjoyed every passing moment.
Life, too, followed a similar rhythm. We owned fewer things, but we seemed to own more time for one another.
Even our celebrations had a different flavour. Weddings were not just about attending a ceremony; they were about spending time together. Most guests stayed together. From morning till night, there was laughter, endless cups of tea, conversations about childhood memories, family stories, and relatives whom we had not met for years. We often recalled the last wedding where we had all gathered and promised to meet again soon.
Today, most weddings are organised in hotels and resorts, offering every possible comfort. Yet, quite often, guests retire to their individual rooms between functions and meet only during meals or the scheduled ceremonies. Everything is efficient, but there is often less time for those unplanned conversations that strengthened family bonds and created memories that lasted a lifetime.
Even our evenings were different. There was no urgency to rush indoors. Children played until dusk while elders sat outside their homes or on the terrace, discussing everything from cricket scores to national events. Nobody looked at a watch every few minutes or wondered who had sent the latest message. Time moved more slowly because relationships moved more deeply.
Perhaps that is what made those moments so memorable.
As senior citizens, we often recall those days with affection. But this article is not an invitation to live in the past. It is a reminder that many of those simple joys are still within our reach.
We may not travel by train for a month, but we can still take a leisurely journey instead of always rushing. We can still carry homemade food, strike up a conversation with a fellow traveller, spend an evening with friends without checking our phones every few minutes, or simply watch a sunset without feeling the need to photograph it.
Technology is a wonderful servant but a poor master. Let us use it to enrich our lives, not to replace real experiences.
The Never Say Retired mission is not about going back in time. It is about carrying forward the timeless values that made life meaningful—human connection, simplicity, gratitude and togetherness. These do not belong to any generation. They belong to every generation.
The good news is that simplicity never goes out of fashion. We can rediscover it at any age. And when we do, we often realise that some of life’s greatest pleasures have been waiting quietly beside us all along.
We remember these moments not to live in yesterday, but to bring yesterday’s simplicity into today’s life. We cannot turn the clock back, but we can certainly slow it down. And perhaps that is the greatest gift we can give ourselves in our second innings. Simple joys never grow old.
Author
The author is the founder of the Never Say Retire mission. In order to achieve this goal, he also runs this website and his Facebook group Never Say Retire Forum has Hundreds and Thousands of members today.
