So far away from a home, yet a home away from
home. I remember how a month ago, I was a painful knot of reluctance and
revolt. How my soul my whole being was opposed to the idea of even continuing
service in the bank . And here I am a month later, making the lease agreement
of the proposed residence I have decided to stay in, liking the place, once again
amused by the resilience . i am eternally thankful to god for giving me this ability
to weather all storms. I guess all I needed to know was that everything will be
alright, with my loved ones. I needed to know that my family can visit here and
stay with me. That all the options were open and viable, that nothing was off
the table. I just needed to know that i was not as vulnerable as I thought I
was. I needed to feel NORMAL or whatever ‘near to normal ‘ I could feel. Here I
am making tea at my so called house, liking it, making up my mind about it.
Slowly taking in the changes, accepting one thing at a time, giving myself
enough slack to adjust with things i found totally unacceptable once. I recall
how a month ago i was living with the philosophy
of ‘one problem at a time....one hour ( couldn’t even take a day at a time) at
a time’
Life has taken a complete U turn in so many
ways. I am so far away from all of my
family, my life, my days as they used to be back in Himachal . Here I miss them
, but a pleasant change is that I don’t miss my office. It was way too
stressful and nothing short of a change like this would have made me this free.
I am enjoying the fact that I have to walk long distances ( I complete almost 8000
steps in a day now) , that the office doesn’t consume all of me, that I can sit
like a dumb duck in a bus and just enjoy the ride ( hot and sweaty but I get to
be moved from one place to another without the stress of driving) . I sometimes
find myself not wanting to accept but somehow life is better here. Better than
it was at Himachal , with the branch pressure. I wish the ghosts stay in the
closets where they belong and I get to quit before any of it turns ugly. And what’s
funny that I catch myself hopefully shoving this worrying into some distant
future. Like I don’t have to fight these battles now, now I can rest and take a
break. I can savor in the space I was luckily or unluckily given to me. Riju, Bandu and kids will join me here and we will slowly adjust to the rhythm of life here.
We will make the most of the time we have here and that is a hope and a promise
for the future.
I am still wondering how fast I adapted. I
had thought I would never laugh, that I would never feel like living any more.
And here comes the reluctant acceptance that god always knows better. I just
wish that now I can think of all my problems with a much saner perspective and
start working on the challenges here.... hope is a dangerous thing. It makes
the impossible, possible.
I hope things will be made better by my
hands, that if nothing at least I will myself be a reason of betterment and
improvement. I want to thrive here now, trying to slowly learn the routes, the
people, and the job. In fact the a settling down has come to such a stage now that i feel like resuming the learning now. A slow sense of acceptance, the sheer awe and wonder of
the dense life that we have here is setting in . A full tenure here is bound to make one feel
sparse and lonely back home (just kidding).
This is a big city life and unexpectedly
here I am living it. Sharing it with my friends and family, sharing the good
and bad of it, the bliss and bane of it. I have a friend here and I have people
rallying with me, all of us tortured by the common ruthless enemy and yet bound
in the desire to survive and to revolt maybe... like i said.... a home away
from home.
How I am eternally thankful to my colleagues
back home, my friends , my family , my colleagues here who came here with me,
and my new friends here.... i would not have thought all this was possible. a month ago i had no vision and no plan to get through any of it. i would have laughed at your face had you told me that i will be writing something like this within a month's time.
I am so glad we took the leap, we faced it
and somehow it seems like we will survive.
