Through the eyes of a child

When you return home after a deplorably bad day at work…just a regular circus day at work… juggling deadlines, a barrage of e-mails, some personal egos, few conflicts and regular ‘must-do’ calls/meetings…you almost feel like a warrior returning to her shelter after the day battle ends at sunset….tomorrow you know you need to go out there and start another battle…there is just enough time to take stock of the damage, nurse your wounds and beef up your motivation to face the opponent…

And then suddenly two tiny arms welcome you home…there she is innocently grinning and taking me  into her Shangri-la…you feel a surprising lightness and ‘nothingness’ when you indulge in her silly little peek-a-boo games….you feel a sheepish embarrassment as you sing nursery rhymes and meekly obey her orders to do some atrocious acts like springing up and down….but few minutes into this make-shift play and you forget the battles that you left behind in the meeting room…you are forced to let go of that urge to beat up a colleague who picked a fight with you…you feel ‘in-the-moment’ and rooted to the concept of home.

And as your mind races to the Herculean tasks hidden in your appraisal carpet..to that flurry of escalations trapped in your mailbox…you see her seriously going about her tasks and duties…...dedicated attempts to build monuments or in other words simply piling a few building blocks…sincere house cleaning exercise but what it essentially is walking with a broom-look alike in all corners of the house…. guiding and mentoring a monkey cuddly toy…and in her mind she is ‘at work’..she is playing her role to the best of her ability..meeting and beating expectations…and you can’t help but break into a smile as you realize that it’s just a perception…what you assume is the world’s most important job assigned to you is ‘child’s play’ for another..and what you presume is a silly child’s play is her most important task for the day…a little bit of role play does help… maybe the management gurus were right after all?

Love in the days of FB

I guess my anti-‘mushiness’ rears its ugly head each Valentine’s day and I just can’t seem to understand or participate in the all red and white and pink frenzy around Valentine’s Day!

Sadly CUPID is out of work in this FB driven ‘love’ recession…all the communication is handled on the so-called ‘wall’ and ‘public’ messages in FB…the lover professes his deep love over the internet and the thousands of members of this FB fraternity have to bear witness to this profound moment in two individuals’ lives! Come on people, remember the word ‘social media’?? It’s just that…a way to interact with society in the fast digital ‘no-time’ days…! It’s not the place for whispering sweet nothingness…not the place for a husband to suddenly realize his wife is the best woman on earth and the stage for that declaration..not your prayer hall where you express gratitude to god for your picture perfect family and godly children….and for your information – GOD may not be reading those FB posts for all you know??

WE love to associate all surreal emotions with material things and I guess our marketing and manufacturing giants have successfully cultivated that relationship..can you imagine Valentine’s day without red roses? Without chocolates? Without diamonds? Without that special dinner voucher? Thanks to years of successful marketing, that association is so strong that it is part of human emotion to expect a flower, a date, a gift to honour and ‘complete’ a Valentine day! Did good old Valentine ever imagine that his death would be converted into such a global ‘super sales’ day?

And imagine if there was a global network outage on Valentine’s day..there would certainly be a great deal of love lost in that outage! Would people have plan B to still go ahead and display that over-abused term called love? Can you communicate real love without use of heart emoticons, without a delivery of roses, without buying that 50% off diamonds? Sometimes all you have to do is put down that device and walk up to your partner and just listen to your favourite song …sometimes all you need is a tight hug from your little child..sometimes all you need is to see that bright smile when you help your parents with a task..love has much more than ’50 virtual shades’!