Sunday nights are all about mental preparations and strategic outlines for tackling Mondays. I know I'll be reluctant to hop out of bed and that I won't feel up to any challenges until the mint and the fluoride hit the gums and the enamel, and the burning hot water hits the skin. It will all have to be timed and choreographed. The guilt will make its appearance right on schedule when A is dragged out of bed early and when she is at Y's doorstep, waiting to be let in. She will probably nap on Y's couch until the bus arrives.
Then I'd have to steel myself to deal with the creeping traffic. Judging by the Channel 2 weather guy's report the most common cause for creeping traffic would be sun glare tomorrow. I'll have to keep an eye on the Rt 80 overpass that can be seen from Rt 46 to spot back to back, creeping cars and trucks in order to decide whether I take the ramp to 80 or continue on 46, braving the scary traffic circle (hate traffic circles!).
My driving stress will end at the park and ride and there will be some reprieve while I snooze. Then something will wake me up, probably the Lakeland Bus driver's radio, as he talks to other drivers, wondering why Lincoln Tunnel is simply not moving.
The next decision would be whether to walk to the office or to switch two trains to get to work. That would depend on whether the bus made it to Port Authority by 8:40 AM or 8:55 AM. The latter would rule out walking. I'd get on the subway and get to work by 9:20 AM. I'd stare at the large clock as I make it through the revolving doors wondering if walking would have been as effective and better for my health. I'd also wonder if there's enough time to get real coffee from Pret or Europa Cafe or whether I'd have to make do with the office coffee, made with awful creamer, because a Dolores Umbridge like office manager has cut off milk or half and half supplies for us after spotting someone pouring some into cereal. Yes, yes it isn't the office's job to keep us in milk and cereal...sigh!
Before I open up the first MS Excel file of the day my mind would already have gone through a complex flowchart littered with if and then choices and consequences.
Then we'll have the midday deadline to meet. A deadline that would have been obliterated had the VPN connection not given me this sweet message on Sunday: Error 429. Unable to resolve server address. Why after three years of VPN access is it suddenly not able to resolve server address? I don't know. I'll never know.
Two and a half hours to create several spreadsheets and pie charts. It would be more than enough time if the servers, the RAM etc were all cooperating and if there was no danger of losing my work because "Save" generated a message "Not Responding". It would be so pleasant if it didn't take twenty minutes to open each file, twenty minutes to save it, twenty minutes to close it because the computer appears unable to handle several open windows.
All this would stress me out because there would be no recourse, no sympathy, the deadlines are mine to meet and anything else amounts to shirking or whining or both.
Through it all I'll stay worried or guilty about A. I'd keep thinking I am forgetting something. I'll wonder if I'd be able to surmount all difficulties and meet the deadline in time for making my 6:10 PM bus. I would need to make sure I leave by 5:40 PM in order to get that bus. I would ideally like to leave at 5:10 PM and get on the 5:45 PM bus but that bus has a midget creep who travels on it, the one who ignores all empty seats and asks to sit next to me. It's just exhausting to keep telling him he can have the seat because I am moving to another one. One would think he'd get the hint by now! So 5:45 must always be skipped.
Whichever bus I take it will always get stuck near the Meadowlands after exiting the Lincoln Tunnel, sometimes for hours on end. That's just the way things are. Through it all I'll be praying for some kind of serenity while the brain wants to keep returning to agony. Must accept what we can't change.
Home! Finally I'll be at Y's doorstep, ready to collect A at 8:00 PM, when most kids are already in bed or an hour away from bedtime. Bedtime just won't happen for her until 10:30 PM. Is that a parenting crime? Will the Super-parent police force come after me with their "tsk, tsks" or more? Some folks would say to me how their goal is to get their kids in bed before 9:00 PM and the words would hit like a million jackhammers on my head.
Through all this choreography, this tightrope walking, this constant planning and strategizing for each twenty four hour period I'll see myself getting smaller and smaller, diminished beyond recognition, expecting nothing, planning for nothing, setting no goals other than the next grocery list, as time goes on.
I've always tried to gaze into the eyes of other women in the family: grandmas, grandaunts, aunts, in sepia toned photographs of yore. Photographs from when they were little girls, from when they became mothers and in their present wrinkled or toothless stage. I don't know what I am looking for...perhaps some signs of a desire to leave an imprint of their having existed, of their having meant something to the line of descendants who owe their existence to them. But I never catch this glimpse. When I inquire about some of the women in our family tree (added in there as "? Mishra" or "? Devi" or "? Jha") people don't even remember the names of the women who were.
Not only is it distressing, it may also be prophetic, as a future person with some fraction of my blood gazes at an old album or an old digital record (even more ephemeral and inconsequential than an old scrapbook or album) and notices nothing but exhaustion and resignation, if anything.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Nothing: Part 27
A thought about loneliness crossed my mind in the last instant: loneliness is not debilitating. One need not weave any lacy ornamentation around the state of being lonely. It can't be painted red, blue or black and it looks just the same to the people who happen to glance at you, it doesn't change your shape or size or smell. It is what it is, just something to feel in a given twenty-four hour period and then get past it to feel something else.
Why write about it then? Well, because this idea is sort of an epiphany. In earlier years, the years when he used to leave on Sunday mornings after deliberately hitting "Play" on the track that bore the Lynrd Skynrd song "Freebird", it might have led to cascading misery; to a downward spiral of thoughts that resembled constant internal whining and external manifestations of gloom along the lines of "why me". But now the "why not me" thought easily cancels out the "why me" thought and we are back to balanced nothingness.
It is a floating nothingness with no moorings, one that allows an astral viewing of time folding in on itself, of things happening, often monotonous and repetitive but with the occasional burst of tantalizing color that fades almost as swiftly as it appeared.
The red tail lights, the gray office walls flushed with fluorescent lighting, the endless arithmetic manipulation of numbers in 17,179,869,184 cells in a spreadsheet are just the parched landscape in my bird's eye view; a desert where a sudden burst of color works its own unique magic. Sometimes this color comes in the form of a tiny, neon green bird that pecks at my kitchen window while my daughter and I run around trying to find the instant when we could "cage" it on film. Or when the cabbage we planted shows us it has nine lives...or more...every time it resurrects itself after being vanquished by birds. It comes while we gaze at the green tomatoes and wonder how long they'll stay hidden from the scampering bunnies and hedgehogs. It will soon come in the color of red when the first strawberries we ever planted ripen. Unless of course the entire patch gets dominated by a killer habanero orange because of the seeds that Mr Freebird scattered everywhere, never in his wildest dreams imagining the profuse fecundity of this killer pepper seed.
The latest brushstroke on the stark canvas came after the purchase of an ancient toy, the Slinky. I never imagined that a slinky would capture an eight year old's imagination to the extent that it did. The Nintendo DSi and all the apps on mommy's iPhone are now forgotten as she works on creating a shoebox, theatrical depiction of Alice in Wonderland where the slinky will play the part of the hole through which Alice takes the plunge into Wonderland. Tweedledee, Tweedledum, Alice and the Cheshire Cat puppets have already been fashioned out of cardboard and the remaining cast of characters will be ready for the grand opening on the day Daddy comes back home for the weekend.
And so, life goes on. She gets her ideas riding in the back seat of my car, I get my passing thoughts on loneliness or love, on being needed or feeling needy, on aging, on contentment or discontent, on expectations or lack thereof, while ferrying us here or there. The thoughts swirl around and evaporate as soon as the ride ends and we step through a door.
Why write about it then? Well, because this idea is sort of an epiphany. In earlier years, the years when he used to leave on Sunday mornings after deliberately hitting "Play" on the track that bore the Lynrd Skynrd song "Freebird", it might have led to cascading misery; to a downward spiral of thoughts that resembled constant internal whining and external manifestations of gloom along the lines of "why me". But now the "why not me" thought easily cancels out the "why me" thought and we are back to balanced nothingness.
It is a floating nothingness with no moorings, one that allows an astral viewing of time folding in on itself, of things happening, often monotonous and repetitive but with the occasional burst of tantalizing color that fades almost as swiftly as it appeared.
The red tail lights, the gray office walls flushed with fluorescent lighting, the endless arithmetic manipulation of numbers in 17,179,869,184 cells in a spreadsheet are just the parched landscape in my bird's eye view; a desert where a sudden burst of color works its own unique magic. Sometimes this color comes in the form of a tiny, neon green bird that pecks at my kitchen window while my daughter and I run around trying to find the instant when we could "cage" it on film. Or when the cabbage we planted shows us it has nine lives...or more...every time it resurrects itself after being vanquished by birds. It comes while we gaze at the green tomatoes and wonder how long they'll stay hidden from the scampering bunnies and hedgehogs. It will soon come in the color of red when the first strawberries we ever planted ripen. Unless of course the entire patch gets dominated by a killer habanero orange because of the seeds that Mr Freebird scattered everywhere, never in his wildest dreams imagining the profuse fecundity of this killer pepper seed.
The latest brushstroke on the stark canvas came after the purchase of an ancient toy, the Slinky. I never imagined that a slinky would capture an eight year old's imagination to the extent that it did. The Nintendo DSi and all the apps on mommy's iPhone are now forgotten as she works on creating a shoebox, theatrical depiction of Alice in Wonderland where the slinky will play the part of the hole through which Alice takes the plunge into Wonderland. Tweedledee, Tweedledum, Alice and the Cheshire Cat puppets have already been fashioned out of cardboard and the remaining cast of characters will be ready for the grand opening on the day Daddy comes back home for the weekend.
And so, life goes on. She gets her ideas riding in the back seat of my car, I get my passing thoughts on loneliness or love, on being needed or feeling needy, on aging, on contentment or discontent, on expectations or lack thereof, while ferrying us here or there. The thoughts swirl around and evaporate as soon as the ride ends and we step through a door.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Nothing: Part 26
Aaron Sorkin's creation, The West Wing, ended its seven year run on May 14th, 2006. I was an avid watcher of this brilliant show but as time goes by and memory fades, I am left to grapple with this one line of dialogue that was spoken by the character of Leo McGarry to the fictional White House staffer - Ali: "That's the price you pay."
It has been over four years since the show last aired but I haven't forgotten those words or the fictional context in which they spoken. I remember feeling uncomfortable as I watched that scene. I balked at the possibility that something like this could happen in the real world even as I applauded Sorkin's brilliance in including such a line in the script.
In this episode, the character of Ali was suspected of being involved in terrorist activities. I refreshed my memory of the scene with the aid of Google's search engine. The dialogue progressed as follows:
Watching then, I was stunned to hear the character of Leo utter those words, was quite shaken and angry despite being aware it was a television drama.
Ali had responded to that remark with confusion and anger, saying, "Excuse me? The price for what?"
I remember that in the final scene of this episode Leo went back to Ali to make amends. He said that he was just about to say that it was the price to pay for "having the same physical features as criminals".
The explanation didn't do anything to appease me. The director didn't show Ali's character appear comforted by the explanation either. The scene faded to black with Buffalo Springfield's song - For What It's Worth - playing in the background: There's something happening here/What it is ain't exactly clear/There's a man with a gun over there/Telling me I got to beware/I think it's time we stop, children,what's that sound/Everybody look what's going down/There's battle lines being drawn/Nobody's right when everybody's wrong...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g9PiEgYYUU&feature=related
The point was made. Pondering this, over the years, there always appears to be a price to pay. It's as though we've all made a collective bargain and are splitting the bill, "going dutch" at this grand buffet of life, even if we refrained from partaking.
The Buffalo Springfield song was a good choice to close out the scene. History repeats itself as Arizona passes a law that allows officials to stop anyone who doesn't look Arizonan enough...I suppose, and to demand that they show their papers or as I read a frequently traveling, brown skinned friend's status message on a social networking site that says he was "randomly" searched five out of the last six times that he traveled.
It is somewhat ironical that the generation that kept beat with this Buffalo Springfield song in 1967 is the same one that is responsible for approving laws like the one that was just passed in Arizona and demanding more of the same. Young people still speak their minds often enough and up to the age where they are not considered "young people" anymore. Life goes on.
There's further irony in that we are all quite willing to "pay this price" submit to searches, deal with being under suspicion for one thing or another because there's a profile that we partially or fractionally share with someone else. We will moan and groan but we will pay as many times as we are required to pay it - for the greater good. No harm, no foul: we generalize, we assume, we profile, we extrapolate. This is how things are, how we are. It has all happened before and will happen again and again...as they concluded in another brilliant show - Battlestar Galactica. :)
It has been over four years since the show last aired but I haven't forgotten those words or the fictional context in which they spoken. I remember feeling uncomfortable as I watched that scene. I balked at the possibility that something like this could happen in the real world even as I applauded Sorkin's brilliance in including such a line in the script.
In this episode, the character of Ali was suspected of being involved in terrorist activities. I refreshed my memory of the scene with the aid of Google's search engine. The dialogue progressed as follows:
ALI: It's not uncommon for Arab Americans to be the first suspected when that sort of thing happens.
LEO: I can't imagine why.
ALI: Look...
LEO: No, I'm trying to figure out why anytime there's terrorist activity people always assume it's Arabs. I'm racking my brain.
ALI: I don't know the answer to that, Mr. McGarry, but I can tell you it's horrible.
LEO: Well, that's the price you pay.
Watching then, I was stunned to hear the character of Leo utter those words, was quite shaken and angry despite being aware it was a television drama.
Ali had responded to that remark with confusion and anger, saying, "Excuse me? The price for what?"
I remember that in the final scene of this episode Leo went back to Ali to make amends. He said that he was just about to say that it was the price to pay for "having the same physical features as criminals".
The explanation didn't do anything to appease me. The director didn't show Ali's character appear comforted by the explanation either. The scene faded to black with Buffalo Springfield's song - For What It's Worth - playing in the background: There's something happening here/What it is ain't exactly clear/There's a man with a gun over there/Telling me I got to beware/I think it's time we stop, children,what's that sound/Everybody look what's going down/There's battle lines being drawn/Nobody's right when everybody's wrong...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g9PiEgYYUU&feature=related
The point was made. Pondering this, over the years, there always appears to be a price to pay. It's as though we've all made a collective bargain and are splitting the bill, "going dutch" at this grand buffet of life, even if we refrained from partaking.
The Buffalo Springfield song was a good choice to close out the scene. History repeats itself as Arizona passes a law that allows officials to stop anyone who doesn't look Arizonan enough...I suppose, and to demand that they show their papers or as I read a frequently traveling, brown skinned friend's status message on a social networking site that says he was "randomly" searched five out of the last six times that he traveled.
It is somewhat ironical that the generation that kept beat with this Buffalo Springfield song in 1967 is the same one that is responsible for approving laws like the one that was just passed in Arizona and demanding more of the same. Young people still speak their minds often enough and up to the age where they are not considered "young people" anymore. Life goes on.
There's further irony in that we are all quite willing to "pay this price" submit to searches, deal with being under suspicion for one thing or another because there's a profile that we partially or fractionally share with someone else. We will moan and groan but we will pay as many times as we are required to pay it - for the greater good. No harm, no foul: we generalize, we assume, we profile, we extrapolate. This is how things are, how we are. It has all happened before and will happen again and again...as they concluded in another brilliant show - Battlestar Galactica. :)