song of the road

Just another day. Eating has been reasonably okay. I have made another big bowl of soup - green beans, onion, potato, carrots and a dash of garlic and vinegar. Yet to taste it. Going to have that with a couple pieces of toast, for dinner. I have got a healthy lunch packed too.

Again the usual feeling of restlessness. I did call up the bank and changed the address for my mom’s account. Still lots of chores left. I didn’t wash my car yesterday. I am yet to organize my papers. Spent most of the weekend reading and watching old seasons of tv serial - this time  “Mahabharat” - a  very popular and a bit old tv series based on what is India’s best written epic. This one book truly has it all and I mean all.

My PC is not getting switched on. I will try once more by unplugging and plugging all cables. Then I guess I would have to call a technician. Hope the modem/router doesn’t go out in the meantime. I will be in trouble without internet. I am supposed to do some night support this month.

Not much happening on the job front yet. Sent my resume to a few agencies. Well, anyway it is a long process. I have to get started properly soon.

Time for work. Hope you all have a very merry christmas!

I have had a nice late start today. Slept late and well. Was working late last night. After a long time, opened work from home. As I was saying, got something urgent to finish before year end. I picked it up myself to get me out of the apathy. I think it is working a bit too. Was working today morning as well. But the connection to my client’s place is flickering. Will have another go after a while.

No gym today as well. I know I need to be more regular than this. But just giving myself a break these days. I feel so nice on the days I am not at work. I am more and more convinced about the new job.

I need to update my resume and get on with it. I have this horrible lethargy to get specially ready for interviews. I generally do reasonably okay. But like now, I can’t really say I am looking for a new job because I had an affair at my current job. I would have to make up a spiel about why I am looking for a change. The thing is the spiel won’t be all lies of course, but it will make me feel like a fraud. I hate that feeling. I am not particuarly ambitious. I guess I should be, but I am not. There is nothing much wrong work wise in this job. Nor am I particularly unhappy with my pay packet. I can say I want to move to Bombay because of family reasons. But I hate again proferring personal problems. It’s like I will never run out of personal problems - so unprofessional. However, need to deal with it. Will get hold of brother. He is very ambitious and will convince me with his ideas and will have a speech ready. I will go with a mix of my diffidence and his arrogance and we will see.

Had a bit of indulgent food this morning. Had a bar of chocolate creme biscuit. Completely unnecessary and not so good either. I had some hot food just before that. So had the chocolate. The stupid thing came free with some sugar free biscuits I bought for work. That IS funny. They gave some sugar free with the sugar free biscuits.

Planning to make some carrot soup. Good to see most of the recipes need milk. I will pour some milk in it rather than drinking it as is. I so hate drinking milk. Had a chat with mom too. We have agreed on principle to have vegetable curries with very little oil and one lentil dish everyday for lunch. I think I will help her in planning the food. I think she hates the daily chore of planning and cooking. Since there is nothing I can do to have dinner early in the evening, I would make it only soup and salad. This would be rather tough in the beginning. I know I would lose sleep first because of the hunger. Hope I would be able to hang in there to form a habit.

Thank you so much for your supportive comments. It has helped a lot. I feel more comfortable about giving up S now. I agree I need to clear up the clutter and the confusions. He is a sweet guy and will have to be a dear friend.

Started with “The Fountainhead” first. Will get to “Atlas Shrugged” afterwards. She somehow helps me in strengthening my backbone. I feel more confident and somehow less alone. Need to some day analyze why.

Everyone have a great friday and better weekend ahead. Love you all.

“That’s what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we’ve changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning.” - Richard Bach.

I did not go to gym today. Well, it was cold and gloomy today, as well. But I also thought I would use that time once more to face what’s happening and talk to myself a bit. Everyday when I see R in office, it does ruin my serenity and my work is suffering badly. I have to get over it. I am so tired of my stupid sad self.

So I remembered, how I knew when I started the affair that most likely it wouldn’t work out. I had decided to enjoy it for the moment and not worry too much about the futute. R had asked me what future I saw and he did say he would try but there was never any guarantee. My brother first asked me not to do this. Then said if I must, I would have go in with my eyes open and should not cry at the end. Well, so what logically was to happen, has happened. I thought, I would love him so much that he won’t be able to do without me and would get over the problems at his end. Well, that did not happen. But that is okay. I tried honestly enough.

I was thinking of the bad things, of the failures that had happened to me so far. In retrospect, each of them seems just the right thing. It sounds awfully stupid - but really, it is almost as if nothing bad has happened to me ever. So maybe, this one is right too. I just need a little time behind me, to see the point.

Meanwhile I need to go on with my work. It bugs me no end to be not able to do my work well. Eating me up, that. I have got my books out. “Atlas Shrugged” is waiting by my pillow for me when I come back tonight. There is a holiday too tomorrow. I had read Ayn Rand first long long back when I had to repeat my first year of engineering. That’s a long story. I had felt I wouldn’t want to show my face to anyone ever again. Sounds silly now. But she gave me the strength somehow. Anyway, let’s see how I feel this time.

Well, that is about it. I am going to face the day with my chin up. I need to be more regular with my exercise and must eat better. But I will sort one thing at a time. Can’t get to it all at once, no use fretting either. Will attack some of my papers tomorrow and start the filing system.

There IS one more thing bothering me. I was trying to not accept it to myself either. But that’s no use anyway. I think S is becoming more than a friend. I have liked him from the first day I met him. He is the one constant sunny presence. Now we flirt quite a lot and that’s not staying so innocent either. We had very good time, both the times we went out. We have a chemistry. Most likely when he comes back next week, we would do it again. and then what?

Again one more affair, with eyes open??? This cannot work out either. Like it has about 10% chance of any long term future. It would be more than a miracle, if it does work out. It won’t. Stop thinking about it. I might have risked it, just for the fun, at any other time. Now I am scared. I cannot even imagine going through the get-over-it-and-move-on once more. So what do I do? I genuinely like him. I cannot simply stop going to the gym. I need those few smiles. Just let it be? and walk straight down to disaster again??

There is no end to this thinking. My drama queen self wants the challenges and the fun and the ruin at the end too, I guess. My logical self is shouting -NO NO NO!!! My whole being wants some peace. As anyway I am planning to change my job, my brother wants me to shift to Bombay where he is. I know I don’t want to go yet - only because of S. Otherwise I don’t particularly love this city.

So - not yet out of one mess, already creating another mess. Hopefully this is happening only because of my overwrought state and would work out or fizzle out soon enough. No, that’s not true either. I was quite attracted to him, even when R was around. What a stupid thing to do! So my plan is to somehow contain this thing to friendship and not let it go beyond that. And who am I fooling? Or maybe it is really nothing much and will be perfectly okay with time - it’s only me dramatizing it. bad bad bad!!!

You know sometimes you get what you want and then it’s a bigger problem. Had to smile at that thought. Well, let’s see. I will survive one way or other.

Love you all. More so for bearing up with me and still sending such love and good thoughts. I must have done some thing very very nice to deserve you.

Horrible horrible weather here today. Generally I love a bit of rain and a bit of a chill. What’s winter without a little bit of cold? Looks like I am getting spoiled by the almost always even weather of Bangalore. I think I am being too irritable.

I woke up to a very rainy, cold and gloomy morning today. Somehow managed to drag myself out of the bed to go to gym. even remembered what Ruby Jean said  - “if you are going to do something anyway, better to do it with all of you”. But kept on making faces and cribbing throughout the workout. Even S had a bad shoulder pain but he was not crabby. Not his usual sunny self either. Anyway, did some weights and no cardio. Will need to do better tomorrow. Also S would be going home tomorrow and don’t think he would be back before Christmas. So need to keep at it myself.

I actually slept for an hour after I returned from gym. I was feeling that crappy. But on the good side, didn’t decide to bunk work yet again. Made it to work after one and half of hour of driving in rain and piled up traffic. Need to go through one more day before the week ends. We have a holiday here on Friday.

I did manage to do the investment thingy yesterday. Now will save some money in the next six months. Dropped the credit card check today morning. So two chores done - many waiting. Need to keep working at it and finish the list. Should make me feel lot better.

 By the way, the presentatin yesterday went well. I was less nervous. My ex-manager who was there told me that I did a good job. Did receive a bit of constructive feedback too. I am sure he complimented me because I was good and not because we share a very good working rapport.

Working on moving away the drak clouds and be cheerful and reasinably happy. Feeling better now and the weather is bothering me less. Will read some good books this weekend - the uplifting ones and give the crime thrillers a bit of a break.

Love to you all.

Well, it is final that I have to try to change the job. All my good work gets unraveled once I come to work. I fully recognize that I lack self-discipline. I yield to every temptation – food and otherwise. Just the beginning of a headache – and I down an aspirin – with the excuse that it would need more than a pill once it turns to a full blown attack. I let myself choose the easy way every time. Like they say – taking the easy way turns a person and a river crooked. Well, I don’t think I am crooked yet but rather irresponsible and definitely very incapable. Look at me, wailing for sympathy at every turn – don’t even need a fall as an excuse.

However that is about it. I refuse to be low. I may not be the best. But I guess I don’t harm people much, except for my long suffering family. I was thinking about an Agatha Christy novel (one of the non-detective ones) I read long back. It was about a lady who was forced to introspect a lot when she had to stay at a God-forsaken station for a few days with nothing to occupy herself. She realized her husband loves someone else and her daughter would rather not be with her. How insufferable she really is. How when her husband saw her off at the station and the train was leaving and he was walking back, there was a spring, a lightness in his step, in his whole being.

I wish perhaps if I could be like her. And stop this self analyzing nonsense. It’s not as if I am changing even a little bit. All I am is – only so much drama. That is why I think I would never be happy. There cannot be anyone who can cope with me. I think I need boyfriends to go away or get tired of me, just to feed my tragedy queen fantasy. I deserve all the stupid things happening to me. I so obviously want the wrong things and then get them and immediately I want something else. And the whole cycle repeats itself. It is not that I am getting the wrong people, it is me who is wrong.

And then I have to live with myself – one way or the other. Need to work on smiling a little bit more. And think about myself a lot less. Need to work better. I think I should perhaps volunteer somewhere - to work with kids. I need to be less selfish with my weekend time. It is always like this – let me cope with this crisis right now and then I will do it. Don’t think the “then” would ever come. Also it’s also that I want to volunteer to serve myself. When I was a kid, all I wanted to become to was “busy”! Didn’t I say I have always wanted the wrong things? Even then I used to think, once I am too busy, I won’t have to think. I am working, I am reading, I am cooking – all to avoid my thoughts so much and still all I am doing is thinking.

I guess I will get my Paulo Coelho books or the Richard Bach books down once more. Or better still, I will start reading Ayn Rand once more. I won’t be able to feel low then.

I will make a list of long pending chores I need to do. And do soon. I have made an appointment tomorrow and will invest some money into mutual funds. I will remember to bring the check book and the papers. I will remember to talk to bro to decide on which funds. Then I will change the address for both mom’s and my bank accounts. Push the funds into fixed deposits for both of us.

I will work this weekend to organize my papers into the folders I have bought. And write to the insurance company. These are the high priority ones which should get done first.

I am not going to let myself take the easy way all the time. I am responsible for myself. The world doesn’t owe me anything. No one owes me anything. I am not going to be only worried about my own happiness. Except I am not going to marry just anyone to make my mom happy. :) Anyway my being unhappy will not make her happy.

I am not going to wallow in self-pity. Not going to stay in bed with my books. I am going to cut down on reading. I will try to be more a do-er. There must be lots to be done at home alone. I will not procrastinate any more and exchange my microwave oven this weekend. I don’t need comfort. Everyone faces an end of relationship once in a while – the world has not ended. Most probably this was a lucky break, in any case.

I am going to take charge of my eating too. As much as possible - no more stupid snacking. Each time I feel like eating when I am not hungry, I will play music, clean something (this will be hard :)), walk, even read or watch tv (in fact maybe not, as definitely this will make me feel like eating more). Exercise properly. Unless I grind my teeth and increase the intensity, the exercise is not going to have any effect because of my increased stamina.

I have a small presentation tomorrow. My boss asked me to take his place. I will try to do a good job. I don’t want anyone to come back and tell him otherwise. Also I think our COO would be there. I need to remember to speak slowly and smile and make eye contact. :) I am rather hopeless in speaking to a crowd but I feel I will do okay. The presentation material is quite good. I won’t run out of things to say.

I need to stop day dreaming so much. I need to come out of my world of books, internet, tv, movies and start being real. I don’t mean I want to give up my optimism and positive outlook about the big picture and turn into a cynic. I don’t. But I want to stop living in my mind and start noticing and enjoying things happening around me. I am sure, my work done well and making my life more organized would please me very well.

So bottomline, I need to control my thinking. Can’t let my thoughts run me. I need to run my thoughts. Maybe will read that book again – “The monk who sold his Ferrari” – I think it was called. And I should be able to do it myself anyway. I know I will fail occasionally but I will do it.

THE ROAD TO WISDOM

 The road to wisdom? - Well, it’s plain
and simple to express:
Err
and err
and err again
but less
and less
and less.

Piet Hein (1905-1996)

Thank you so much for all your lovely comments. You really are the light of my life.

The weekend is over. I got to recharge my batteries. A few remarkable things happened too. I will be back a while later to write down a longish update.

Love you all.

Well… you know how it is some days. Gloomy weather. Feeling lost. I know I over dramatize. Maybe I should just stop thinking, justifying, analyzing so much. What are they but endless excuses. or just accept it and move on. I am not making sense to myself today.

Did go to gym. Did some workout. But again that.. feeling so sorry… sitting slumped in my chair.. don’t want to see any face… But I know one way or other, I will be kind of okay in a while.. let me go downstairs and brew a cup of organic tea.. or maybe play a bit at freerice.com… something…

I am going to chuck it all tomorrow and take some long rest with my books. it’s good that I made it to work all days this week.. now I need to be down for a while.

Everybody have a restful weekend.

A beautiful thought. I had heard it before but somehow round pointed it out at a particularly appropriate moment. That reminds me again, what would I do without the support and love from you all. The way we have been able to connect despite the different countries, time zones and culture, isn’t it just amazing? I love you.

I was thinking about what round said. It makes the perfect sense. But (obviously there has to be a but everywhere) when we are our own customer, what should we do? Don’t we find it much easier let ourselves down. I mean, if I have a responsibility say to fix a client’s application because his accounts don’t match, I will do everything to get it fixed ASAP because he pays me for it. I will be restless till it is done. But if it is my accounts that don’t match, it would generally wait for much longer and may not get done at all at times. This is just an offhand example. So, my point is maybe we need stricter goals when it is for us alone because we may slack  off more. But then again to break a habit of putting oneself last most times may need smaller doable goals first to get into the habit.

On the work front, I sometimes have to push my folks a little harder. They would often promise much under. So I sometimes  override a bit and cut buffer a bit when I am quite sure more would get done at that time. And I always back them up or come up with an alternate plan if things go wrong. My team perfectly meets their targets and often do more. It’s me who struggles with my work load (by which I mean the programming I should do myself) and the constant juggling, prioritizing, discussing, handholding, refereeing, soothing that I must do for the team. I love my team but I think I need to sit down and try to streamline things a bit more. It is going fine but it should be easier for me. I need not feel so bone tired at the end of my days. So again I need to think on round’s advice on this aspect of my life too.

I did go to gym today. Woke up a bit late and very tired. Did my work out with S. I was feeling laggard and slow. Somehow managed to do a reasonable amount of exercise. Without S there to cajole and push and make me smile, I would have run away after the first ten minutes. Have quite an amount of muscle pain from Monday’s work out and yesterday’s over enthusiastic cardio. So no cardio today. I will try to wrap my work sooner today and will try to catch up on sleep. Though the tiredness could be due to my t.o.m which started today.

I will do as much weights and cardio I can do, this week. Then I will adjust my goals for the month. I need to sit and think a bit.

Did bad food wise yesterday. Was going fine till dinner. I was quite full too. I don’t know why then I had a super strong craving for some pure junk food and then just went and had them. What bugged me is that they were so unnecessry. I was so sleepy I could hardly keep my eyes open to eat them. I could just gone to sleep without eating them too. *shaking my head in consternation*

It could be the heavy tiredness which is messing up with my mind. Or it could be the thing again which kept me away from work last week. I must make it to work everyday this week. I need to go to work everyday and then make it to gym every weekday. Maybe if I slip somewhere else but can make these two for a few weeks, I can slowly work out the other problems too - one day at a time.

I had a much messier breakup with the boy friend of my first serious relationship. I would rather not remember the stupid things I did which I am so ashamed of now. But when I could fall no lower, I decided to handle one day at a time. I would tell myself that maybe all the happiness that I could have, cannot be more than that can be held in my two palms. In my palms, I can hold the joy of an unexpected hearty laugh at a witty comeback, maybe a few minutes of really good coversation, reading a good book, eating something nice, making someone else smile. And that can more than carry me through a day.

There is one more slightly curious thing happened. R’s dad has been rather unwell for last ten years or so. He was seriously ill about 6-7 years back and has been in precarious health ever since. Now suddenly things have turned for worse again. When I found that out yesterday, I was numb with guilt for half an hour or so. When R came back from home and told me the “no-go”, I was seriously put off and I did wish ill for all of them for a few days. But it cannot be that, can it? It just cannot. I asked him and found out that his folks know that we are not going ahead. So that cannot be the cause. I know it is not my fault at all, but the curious timing has scared me a bit. It’s not as if I wish them anything any more. Whatever has happened, has happened. As R pointed out (to make me crazily angry) that it was my fault to think that things would work out. Anyways no point thinking about it any more. If R needs help, I don’t think he would need help, but if he does, I will do all I can, so I can sleep easy.

Everyone have a great day! Weekend is not so far away.

Well, I walked and cycled 15 kms today. Really had to grind my teeth to stay on the cardio machines. Managed to stay put for 90 minues though I changed machines many time in between. In my gym, during rush hours we are not supposed to use any cardio equipment for more than 15 mins at a stretch. And the mornings are rush hours generally. I sometimes just key in the pass code (I found out by looking over someone’s shoulder - not the right thing to do - I know - but I have to be that much of a software person) and exercise a little more. But rarely when others are waiting, I swear. Mostly I innocently ask the trainers to punch in the code.

Well, my exercise goals are not looking so acheivable any more. I had planned for something which would stretch me a little. Now with my 7 days of bunking gym, they are going to stretch me a lot, if at all I can make it. I am planning to give it a shot.

If I work out every single day (I think the gym would be closed on at least two days this month, if not more), I would need to walk/cycle 10 kms a day to meet my goal. But I would have to work out more than 3 hours a day to meet the exercising goal. I guess I can safely say goodbye to the work out goal. There is no way I can work out that long. Let me think about it and maybe I would readjust this goal. Or shall I leave it anyway and let’s see by how much I miss it. The walking/cycling goal can be done - perhaps. Just perhaps, I think. Let me try to make that at least. My legs are hurting already. My knees might go away or become very strong by end of month. All this assuming that I won’t bunk again.

Nothing much is up really. I did quite okay food wise yesterday. One of team members got engaged last week. He got some lovely sweets to work  yesterday. Ended up having a couple of them - must be 500 cal each. Otherwise did okay.

Things on the personal front are improving slowly, I think. Sometimes when we are discussing something at work, or teasing our newly engaged friend mercilessly, suddenly our eyes will meet uninetntionally and R’s smile will break my heart. He has a beautiful smile. But WTH, all beautiful things are not meant to be had, some should stay on the shelf and away from reach, I guess.

Love you all. Let’s work together towards a better mid week.

As of now, back to work. Finished reading the huge number of emails. Will have a ton of catching up to do. But must say the team has done well in my absence and they have not created any mess, as far as I can see.

But I do feel, it would be better to move on. Thank you all for agreeing with the job change idea. I would need to soon get on it. Slowly the gloominess is descending as I am back. But it could be due to the refrigerator atmosphere. And maybe I have not lost as much of my anger, as I thought from the safety of home. However I have loads of work to keep me busy and some other good colleagues to keep me smiling a bit. I need to get through these days one day at a time. I am not going to let someone have the satisfaction to see how much he had managed to hurt me.

Anyways, had the dinner with S yesterday. He wanted to watch a movie too but didn’t say it early enough. I wouldn’t have minded another movie at all. We went to this big restaurant where they serve Indian and Arabic food. A joint we would call a “pure non-vegetarian” restaurant. Actually we have many restaurants in this part of the country who serve only vegetarian food and uses only vegetarian ingredients. Hence the corollary nomenclature of “pure non-veg” restaurant. Practically, I don’t think there can be any restaurant without a single vegetarian dish - at least a cucumber salad would be there, generally.

I was quite excited to try out some funky dishes, hoping some thing veg would be there. But they had some trouble with the kitchen and terrace sitting was closed. So we walked down to a good old KFC in a nearby mall. S had fried chicken and I had a veg. burger. Then we had ice cream from Baskin Robbins.

Food was quite good (taste-wise, the ice cream must have been quite high cal.) but the conversation was better. S made me tell why I was bunking gym. I somehow felt very stupid and embarassed talking about R, so summed it up in a few sentences. On the other hand, heard about his first love (which he lost of course) and he actually sounded quite sad (I was a bit surprised). Heard about a lot of his and his gym cronies’ antics. (Made me think Huckleberry Finn, on a few occasions - naughty guys those). It was very good fun. Didn’t realize the time flowing away so fast. I think we might do this again soon. Well, I am sure it won’t be soon, but definitely sometime. Looks like I have found a good friend who is not from work (thank God for that). He can’t take place of my bro but maybe he can be a tenth of him (fun-wise) in time. Keeping fingers crossed, so this doesn’t get screwed up.

Round, I agree with you. I am planning to exercise as much as possible and try to do more intensity wise (since time-wise won’t be easy) and be a reasonably good eater. I too think it is far better to have favorite foods in moderate quantity once in a while. And anyway I do not think there can be any food which is all bad. We do need fat for our brain and skin and hair and nails (as far a I know). So moderation is the key.

Though on the front of paying attention to food, I have a problem. During breakfast and lunch, I do okay. But dinner and all snacking often accompany a book. Nowadays I generally eat dinner with mom, so that’s better than reading and eating. But to stop reading and snacking, I need to walk a long road yet. It’s as if good food must be accompanied by a good book (like good wine, maybe?). Need to work on that.

Workout today was good. The intensity has been increased a bit. Also maybe because of the break, I took longer to be out of breath. There seems to be a body building championship next month. So a few guys in the gym were training for that. They were doing something called “failure reps” (not sure, if I caught the name right) with heavy weights. The poor guys were doing literally 300 to even 500 repetitions. Where most of the time, I can barely do 30 and even only 10 if the weight is increased a  little bit. I was getting scared for them. But the muscles didn’t disintegrate as I felt they definitely were going to. But too much bulging muscles is such a turn-off. Lean muscles any day.

Everybody have a great start of week. It’s time for me to wind up my long chattering and go back to back. Love you all.

PS Just received an email from a college friend. She is pregnant and expecting her baby in June. I am very happy for her. But feeling a little wistful. Hello, the guy upstairs, will I ever?