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Perhaps its the season. Perhaps its my stars. Whatever be the reason, Jan & Feb always puts me through a bad patch. I struggle a lot through the two months. Personally , Professionally , health wise and even wealth wise. And those months also takes me back to my past , making me feel gutted. How badly I wish, I could sit on a timemachine to go back and flick all the switches that went wrong.
Today also, I was sitting in the flat wondering whether to go for work or not. I had already told my team that I might not come. Sitting alone with a fag in hand, my mind went back once again to the past.
About two years back, I got a call from my schoolmate Manu to join for a party in Unni's house in Kollam. It was Unni's engagement . I had to drive a car to ernakulam anyway, so a little detour was not at all a problem. Later that evening , five of us (Manu, Harshan , Unni , Koshy and your's truly) joined at the 'Azhakathu Veedu', tharavad of Unni. Its a typical tharavad that you see in movies with a water front. What else can you ask for, to party ?
What I like the most about schoolmate's gettogether is that , we get representatives from different professions and roles. Defence people, Managers, Software Engineers , Doctors, artists , entrepreneurs ... you name it they would be there . That evening was no different.
After a quick warm up, all of us were relinquishing the days we played in the school , competed against each other in the school. Koshy was Prasad-House goalkeeper for a football match in 10th standard. Today he was all smiles , explaining how he managed to push the ball through a small hole in the net , which went un-noticed by the referee. Opposition team, Tagore House , was all agitated as they were sure that it was a goal. Talking about that stint with luck , Koshy still remains the same jolly guy I know of.
We also talked about our Basketball matches, specifically with St Thomas School for Sarvodaya Cup. It was the finals , and we had a good group of cheerleaders for our team. When the final whistle blew we lost the game for 1 point. Had the last throw went into the basket we would have been the victorious. But someone up there had different plans. The entire team and cheerleaders had a sad home coming after the match.
8 years passed since that day, we were still trying to defend ourselves . We were discussing how we faced a lot of unfair decisions from the referee. Thats when someone ( I still dont remember who said it , it was definitely from a defence guy ) started being philosophical.
"If you look at it, life is nothing but a collection of games. You are always trying to compete with someone or something . Be it an interview you have to get through, be it a target that you have to meet, be it a test that you have to pass , its all a game. Sometimes you win , some times you end up being the runner-up. The result has never once been the end of the world for any of us. We still continue to play the games of targets and deadlines , don't we? Look back and you'll see that being a runner-up does not hurt that much."
"Having a civilian life, in that context, is very advantageous. You guys can mess up royally in your work, and still get a second chance to come out better and stronger. You might end up being the runner up in one interview, but can always try for another one."
"A defence personnel should always be the winner ", he took a breath, "In the games that we play in battle fields, runners-up wont get another chance. Forget another chance, they wont even exist after the game."
There was a dead silence after he said those words. Each of us were re-analysing our situations. Without any words exchanged one by one , we all walked to the river front.
That day, I realised how lucky I'm. I get a lot of shouting from different quarters everyday. From superiors or from subordinates . When they both are happy, customers would be the ones doing the honors.
So what ?? Neither did the sky fall on my head nor did the earth give way under me. I'm still breathing and I do have another chance , to correct , to improve , to win. I might have made a mistake or two. I might have failed miserably in one thing or other.
SO WHAT ?? I quickly cancelled my leave , came to office ....and wrote this blog for all of you to read. You might as well ask me ... "So What?"
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