Each year, drawing to an end, makes me sad; just like I anticipate each new year as the harbinger of newer things, of hope that maybe this year things would work out. Maybe this year I would have closure, salvation from demons, exciting opportune moments. Yet the year’s end is as dismal as was the start. Whatever promises there were have turned out to be hog washes and illusions. The weekend brought yet another disappointment and this time around the disappointment also became evident in my attitude, or rather I made no efforts to mask it under indifference or control. Or it was tiredness - I dunnow. My entire adult life has stopped making sense to me. Maybe I am going through all this now so that I don’t have to suffer in after life. I remember those days with that absolute soul crushing depression, that soul numbing silence inside, the days when I couldn’t get out of bed and yet always would, putting a brave front in front of the world, and remembering that state of mind, those days, I tell myself that if I could get past this, I would get past this too…to what end? Nothing …till my life draws to a decent end. I run into old classmates, with three kids in tow, I politely evade their questions, take their number and throw those chits away. I see kids who grew up in front of me, starting families and I look away, into the oblivion I always look into.
As for work, it was an interesting week. Relentless working to meet deadlines and the menacing call from a client representative, where he just flew off the handle – placed unreasonable demands and screamed when they weren’t met. Updated boss about it, the coordinator guy seconded my observation, and then boss called up the rep, negotiated terms in brief and polite manner. Touché. I learnt from the coordinator guy that the miffed client rep sort of apologized for his behavior by saying: “Yaar I acted a bit rudely because I have had a tummy ache.” Imagine, the marketing manager of one of the prominent channels behaving like this in the first place and then justifying his behavior like that. When I look at these people, the so-called movers and shakers of the industry and behavior, I feel amazed how they live with themselves. This wasn’t all, one of the managers at the company spoke rudely to me in front of other colleagues because somehow my computer generated prints out of error and they were found lying around a forlorn printer and I wasn’t aware of it. I felt like explaining but couldn’t because I was way too shocked by the way he spoke, and by the time I gathered by composure, it was too late to speak out. But then fate provided me sweet revenge, when I had to conduct an in house interview with him the very next day, and I asked sweetly masked questions with double meaning, making me squirm and then he couldn’t stop smiling and even sent boss an email praising my write-up. My family recently asked me to quit, seeing the rigors of work taking their toll on me. It had to do more with security situation in the city and lack of decent commute options and my late sittings. So yes I am at a weird place in life and at work. And I feel disconnected with it all. I don’t feel like throwing myself in work anymore, like I used to whenever life’s “other aspects” used to make me feel melancholic and disappointed, because I have discovered work to be an illusion as well, everything fades, friendships run their course, no matter how sincere are you with people, things and your work, it would turn sour eventually. At the end of the day, what would keep you grounded in life would be you. Nothingness, no one else.
PS: Commuting problems still continue, and city’s law and order situation isn’t helping. A weird day at work, I commuted back in taxi, alone, in the evening. The other day, the car’s brakes became functional mid way and I was able to negotiate my way back home from work somehow. No matter how many chances I wont like to take with life, somehow, in some days, it throws me at the deep end.
