Celebrating a Birthday During the Lock Down

My seven-year-old was teary-eyed when she learned that she would be celebrating her birthday just with her maternal grandparents and sister this time – no friends, no parents, no going out to party – thanks to the lock down. She felt better when Mom assured her that after returning from her vacation, she would have a birthday bash the way she wanted.

Finally, the day arrived.

Mom and dad arranged for the party with all the energy they had. Sister and her hubby chimed in. My uncle, too, took out a few minutes from his busy schedule to show up at the right moment, like always. My husband and I, along with a few other close ones, joined via a video call to witness the hungama.

It was heartening to see how much time, effort, and creativity each of them put in to make the little one’s day special. Since there were no gift/cake shops open, everything had to be home-made – the cake, the pudding, the gifts (a greeting card and a bracelet done by my nine-year-old for her sister). 

All in all, it was quite an event, bigger than expected, proved by the broad smiles and excitement shown by the children. Blessed to be part of this family.

Confessions of a Mother

It’s been 20 days since the kids and in-laws have left for a trip. How do I feel?

For the past few years, I wondered if I would ever get a day without having to look at the clock, if I would ever be left alone at home at least for a day, or if I could skip cooking, cleaning, etc.

Finally, that period has came. I feel serenity, joy, and peace of mind in not having to attend to the daily chores. True that I still cook food, clean the house, etc., but I am not obliged to! The point is, I can choose not to! Or I can do it whenever I please.

You can call this mere laziness. The thing is – I still do all these things – on time! The mere thought that I need not do it right away gives me the energy to do it right away.

Read that again.

I still do all the work on time. But, since there’s no obligation for me to do the household chores, I do them with more energy.

And, anyways, cooking food for just me and my husband is like a cake walk – it’s like asking a 5^th grader to answer the question paper of a 1^st grader. I just need 30 minutes to 1 hour to wrap up all my household work – even without the maid.

I know I should be missing my kids now. But I am still unpardonably happy that they are away. You can call me a bad mother, but I feel all mothers deserve a breather like this. I feel blessed that I have one. I feel happier than I would be if I were on a vacation with my close friends because I also have a lot of time to focus on my office work, career, health, and fitness.

Are you guys with me?

A Reflection on Classic Literature

Reading classics is like falling in love.

The first couple of chapters are strange and hard to follow. After you get a hang of the writing style, you inch towards understanding the literature better. When you are not reading the book, you recollect some of the words, and are amazed at how well they were written. It is hard to say when exactly you have begun liking the book, and what exactly you like about the book.

By the time you finish the book, you are left with a peaceful and pleasant feeling. The characters in the book leave a mark in you – most of them are strong and influential.

Blessed are the souls who read classics. I wish I could meet the people behind these books.

P.S: I am currently reading Anna Karenina, written by Leo Tolstoy. It’s an 800-page book, and I am still in page 70. And, I am wondering when exactly I have fallen in love with the book. Now, I can’t think of anything other than the book.

Why Farewells are Hard

There’s so much going on at the moment. I feel as if there’s a clock inside me constantly ticking ‘Oh my God! Oh my God!’ So, I have resorted to penning it down.

Almost everyone in the team knows about my relocation now. But, they have been behaving as if they don’t (because they have been asked to). In a way, this is good – I won’t feel as emotional and nostalgic if they don’t mention anything about the move.

Will I ever find a team as awesome as this one? I am fortunate to work with people who offer sincere advice like a sibling, go out of the way to drop me home on a rainy day, worry about me if I leave office mid-day, hold a door open for me when I sprain my hands, off load my work, and help me before I even realize that I need help. More than anything, these are people who respect me and love me for what I am (including my craziness).

To top it all, Natasha has become as protective as a mother sending her child to a boarding school. It makes me want to hug her.

Leaving this office will be as hard as leaving college. I still remember the day we ate our dinner in silence on the last day of our college. I hope I move on and get busy with my work to overcome this nostalgic feeling.

New Year Resolutions - 2019

A part of my brain is in my pen (now, the keyboard); so, unless I pen down some things, they will not sink in.  

So, here comes my list of new year resolutions:

• Spend more time with kids: My target is at least 30 minutes each day.
• Read/watch work-related content: My target is at least 1 hour per week. And, this means that I’ll have to sacrifice a part of my time reading my all-time favorite classics to reading/watching something useful for my career.
• Improve communication: There’s more to effective communication than just speaking fluently - it is communicating the right thing to the right people at the right time. And, I aim at mastering this skill.
• Stick to my diet and work out: All 12 months of the year – no excuses.
• Learn swimming: Waiting for summer to begin.
• Plan for two vacations: One with the entire family and the other with just my better-half.

Let me look back at them towards the end of the year. Till then, wish me good luck!

Memoirs of the STC Conference

The Journey: Uttering a hundred silent thanks to my manager for nominating me, I headed to the Bangalore airport to attend the much-awaited STC conference. It was relaxing to hang out with a colleague without having to worry about deadlines (both at office and home). As soon as we reached our rooms, we were welcomed by another colleague who had arrived from Hyderabad.

The Stay: So what if the rooms were smaller than expected? The cleanliness of the rooms, the friendliness of the staff, and the yummy, fresh, and healthy breakfast were enough to ensure we had a good stay. It also gave us a good platform to get to know one another and discuss about work too.

The Conference: There were more than 200 technical writers from various domains, experience levels, and ethnicity. Contrary to our belief that only highly experienced people would be presenting at the conference, there were people like us. It made us feel confident that next time we too could come up with an idea or a concept to present. One thing common among all of them was the ever-so-bright smile and warmth in greeting one another. During the two days of the conference, we attended sessions related to xml-based authoring, automation in writing, contextualized writing, and many others – even the sessions that we felt were not relevant to us had some take-aways for us. It was amazing to see the world of technical writing expanding; when I started my career, nobody even knew about our profession. And oh! The food was sumptuous.

The Re-Union: The moment I heard I was going to visit Mumbai, I devised a plan to meet one of my best friends, Mrunal. Being the early bird that I am, the day after conference, I woke up at 5.30, got ready, and saw myself in front of her house at 6.30. Poor thing had just woken up, but was super-thrilled to see me. Munching yummy poha, both of us chit-chatted excitedly, and woke up the rest of the household, who also joined us in our conversation. I told her family how important Mrunal’s role was early in my career.

The Sight-Seeing: The moment I stepped into the city, I fell in love with it. Be it the pollution-free air, the pace at which the city-dwellers moved, the willingness to help and adjust in an over-crowded train, the presence of people 24X7, or the flea markets with unbelievably low prices, the city impressed me. Therefore, it did not take me a lot of time and money for shopping. And oh! how could we return from Mumbai without visiting the Juhu beach? Thanks to the fast-paced world of Mumbai, we did everything that we wanted to do – shopping, sight-seeing, and visiting a friend.

The Return: If at least one thing does not go wrong in a trip, then what’s the thrill? So, we ended up in terminal 1 instead of terminal 2 to board the flight. Luckily, we had enough time to catch a taxi, and reach terminal 2 on time. Oh wait! Is this an airport or the palace of God Indra? It was so picture-perfect that we forgot how much work awaited us back in Bangalore. We just enjoyed the moment sipping kokam sharbat.  

The After-Effect: For the next two days, I was happy, excited, and smiling all the time. I had to tell myself to come out of the ecstasy, and focus on my job. 

Animal Farm - George Orwell

Rating – 5/5

One line for the book: Tragic, yet amusing; Sad, yet sarcastic; Fiction, yet true - Another book that should be part of the curriculum for college students.

About the book:  The animals in a farm gain independence from the human rule after a rebellion. But, the corruption and prejudices between the different kinds of animals lead to one kind dominating all the others, thus erasing the difference between the hardship they find in human supervision and the freedom they gain by the animal rule. History repeats itself when the animals are back to poverty and slavery even after gaining independence. 

The book is a political satire on how the people in power misuse their resources for their benefit. One can easily draw an analogy with India before and after the British rule. If there's one book that our corrupt bureaucrats should read, it is this one. 

What I love about the book: Each and every page, every word of it. It's not a single word less, nor a single word more.

What I did not like about the book: The tragedy.

What I learned from the book:

• Unity is strength.
• One corrupt person in power is like a drop of poison in a pitcher of water. He/she can drastically bring irreversible changes to the society.
• People have a very poor memory, thus giving an opportunity to our leaders to manipulate the facts for their benefit.