Reality is a dog only da...
Assessing yourself feels weird. You always felt you were bound to do something impactful and were meant for a greater purpose. But yes, reality is a female of the canine type(Me is a feminist and me avoids using such derogatory words directly).
Like I wanted to be an astronaut as a kid. Space had always fascinated me as a kid. I mean,stars were shiny and all. And the thought of jumping around on the moon excited me. I used to practise it on the sofa imagining I was on the moon's gravity field. So my answer to Subramanian uncle's "What do you want to do in life?" was to walk in space. Subramanian uncle smirked. I did not know why. (Unimportant information: Subramanian uncle secretly smoked and I caught him once)
But how hard could it be to walk on space? As an 8 year old, here is how I imagined my typical day as an astronaut would be like. The mother would probably wake me up screaming "Dei endhiri da(get up), it is 7.30 already". My subconscious mind would know that the mother was actually lying and it actually was only 6.50 A.M. I would request for 5 more minutes and I would be off to sleep again. The mother would repeat the process 3 more times and after a request for a "last and final one minute", I would wake up successfully at 7.30 A.M (this time the real 7.30 A.M).
After the mundane morning tasks, I would probably be searching for my astronaut suit. "Amma, astronaut suit enga? (Astronaut suit where?)", I would probably be screaming. "Dei, wait da. I am still ironing it", would be the mother's reply. "Ma, you need not iron the suit. It is wrinkle free only". Still, I get my suit ironed and I negate the effects of the ironing process while I wear it. I probably would be spending some 10 minutes searching for the glass helmet thing and my oxygen mask. Finally after finding it in my pile of clothes in the bedroom, I set off to catch my auto where my ISRO colleagues would be waiting.
But yes, the mother has to embarass me by chasing me down to the auto screaming "Dei, you forgot your lunch. I made some puliodharai(Tamarind rice) with vadams(Crunchy side dish), which you very well deserve for safeguarding them in the terrace from perilous crows". "Ayyo, I don't want lunch and all. I will eat at the canteen", I say in despair and embarrassment while my colleagues sitting in the auto clad in astronaut suits smile at me. However, I am burdened with the lunch case and off I go to the auto and the driver Alagappan pulls the handle from below and takes off.
But this was not meant to be. Being an astronaut was not just about wearing ironed astronaut suits or taking Tamarind rice for lunch. It was a naive imagination that I had conjured up in my mind.There was a lot of physics and Maths involved. (a+b) ^2, S= UT + 1/2 at ^2 , F=MA , WTF = Amma *Ayyo and everything else. This was all too much man. So I gave up on the astronaut dreams. I decided to become Basha. I wanted to be a feared underworld don(with a really good heart and all), who had a wolf like Alsatian on his right, Janagaraj for comic relief standing behind me and some Singh who I picked from a random crowd, standing to my left, just as a symbol of unity in diversity. In a sad twist of fate, the poor Singh gets killed by my arch rival Mark Anthony.
But then as I grew up, I realized that this was not possible in real life. There was no way you could become a Basha. And even films slowly lost their charm. There was nothing new in films. Nothing worth seeing in movies. The same old poor boy loving a rich girl and the same evil village minor raping an innocent girl(depicted by a 3 second shot of a pumpset. Pumpsets have been more useful in depicting rapes by village minors than minor irrigation) .
When in doubt, go with the flow. And the only thing that was flowing here was Engineering. So yes, I went back to Maths and Physics. And I realized that in our world, every engineer has a place for herself/himself(feminist). There are great engineers who have a job, there are average engineers who have a job and there are useless engineers who have a job. And these useless folks are the ones who are absolutely useless. Even a condom can be used once, but not these folks. But yes, life goes on and here we are doing something or the other, filling up timesheets and making up graphs on MS Excel.
P.S
*Few decades later. At the place we go after death.
Attendant: Please hold on here sir. That queue is for the premium dead, the IITs, Stanfordians and the like. You have to wait 50 minutes before we open the gate for you.
Me: Ok. I will wait.
Attendant: Before you stand here waiting, please say "MurungakkaSambar Kosambari". This is like a captcha text we use, to make sure you are not a bot.
Me: MurungakkaSambar Kosambari