Thinking of you dad, on father's day

As a child my father's diabolical personality always fascinated me.

His famous temper threatened to bury everyone in its fury. The slightest facial manifestation of a temper trouble - a menacing nerve twitching with raw emotion, angry furrows, and pursed lips, made me and my sister run for cover. My mother was also insightful enough not to ruffle his feathers when he appeared "negatively charged".

However, his temper was not the only trait which defined his personality.

His sense of humor deliciously peppered with measured doses of cynicism, wit, sarcasm and raciness, could knock out even the most bland and straight faced person.

Just yesterday, after waking up from his mid-afternoon siesta he hatched a very productive plan of creating a "unique" Orkut profile for my mother. The shrill enthusiam in his voice reeked of treacherous intentions. Once I gave an appreciative nod of a person "in the know", Dad set about his business.

The "Personal" page of my mother's faceless profile had the following details punched in, much to every pervert scrapper's delight...

Ideal Match - Rajkumar (with all due respect to the deceased star - Maa what were you thinking???)

First thing you notice about me - My five feet nothing frame

Build - A few extra pounds (now my mother is not exactly a "yummy mummy", know what I mean...a few extra pounds is a very modest comment....this was added after some evil chuckles and Hi-5's)

Body Art - Strategically placed tattoo (Well I love my mum like the rest of her brood....I swear I do...but honestly all tattoo parlours would shut shop if she ever decides to get a tattoo ....and a strategically placed one at that!!!)

My idea of a perfect first date - Too late in the day

Turn Ons - tattoos (not again!!), candlelight and wealth (makes my mother sound like a gold digger)

Passions - Nagging my husband and children (way to go Papa, you finally did it!)

Sports - The only one's I've played is Chiti Dhap and Kho Kho (now hide-n-seek on my profile doesn't sound as bad...now does it???)

Living - with partner, friends visit often, party every night (The last time my parent's partied was when my sister finally passed high school with "respectable" marks, a decade ago!)

Good for gags....Isn't it?

Internal Upheaval

Hassled me: Why 710? Why dear Lord? Why couldn't I break into the elite 750+ club?

Somewhat Unflappable me: Take a deep breadth...Clear your mind and let the rational thoughts prevail...

Rational Thought 1 : Even though you didn't break previous records (read 800!!!) held by some imaginary moderator on your study forum, 710 is a handsome score which fits well in the larger scheme of things

Hassled me (interrupting) : but 710 does not commensurate with my efforts and expectations (more importantly the latter, rather than the former!).

Somewhat unflappable me (cooing pacifyingly): Honey...the score is pretty much in line with your "originally hatched" expectations (remember when you were all starry eyed about breaking the 700 barrier!!)...They might however not be in line with your revised expectations...Remember expectations are a function of thoughts, peer-generated benchmarks (real and imaginary) and past laurels ...which unfortunately renders them dynamic.....which effectively means that you might have felt cheated with a score of 800, in a deliriously optimistic moment!!!!

Hassled me (refusing to let go): But I still don't feel satisfied with the outcome...

Somewhat unflappable me: Satisfaction like optimism is a practised art and not an inborn trait...you need to cultivate these feelings consciously

Hassled me: But doesn't an overdose of optimism breed complacence?

Somewhat (un)flappable me: Being optimistic does not mean that you should allow complacence to feast on your hard-working spirit...It means breathing realism into your expectations, staying miles away from self-deprecation and most importantly learning to let-go.....Put in your best efforts, and clip the umbilical cord, detaching yourself from the pain/pleasure of your performance....Gloating over your success for too long, steals your focus...Likewise obsessing with failure robs you of your confidence....So in the end you see it's all about the power of balance!!!

Of experiments and more...

Sneaked into a theatre to catch Spidey in action; came out wondering - Why in the name of God, do people experiment with well-established success formulas ?

Just when you turn to the comforting familiarity of your friendly neighborhood Spiderman, he gets a bad-boy makeover!!! Spiderman flirting with his darker side??? He tousles his hair, flirts with unknown strangers, swaggers on the street, and worse still, wears a Gothic grey bodysuit (bumming hard guys!)....I think to myself - why do these rookie directors meddle with the "formula"....Aren't their enough baddies in the world?...Poor Tobey McGuire....He was so convincing as the earnest-looking Peter Parker.... And now he is visibly outside his comfort zone as the menacing Spiderman

The seeds of this “radical” change (read : experimentation ) were sown by none other than Her Majesty’s favorite Secret Service Agent – James Bond. When Bond came out of a long and painful sabbatical (putting casting wars and remuneration woes firmly behind him), I was thrilled to bits. As a die-hard patron of Ian Fleming's classic franchise, I have watched all James Bond movies several times over; So much so that I had learnt to lip-sync the dialogues long before I learnt to tie my shoelaces!!

However, Casino Royale left me wishing that the character was given a dignified burial right after Die Another Day. Even though Casino Royale won the hearts of the most disparaging of critics, and broke all box-office records, somewhere it jabbed hard at my loyal Bond sentiments. Brand name Bond was built around adjectives such as suave, sophisticated, smooth, guarded and invincible ; not around adjectives such as emotional, gullible, reckless and vulnerable. After years of preserving his unflappable tough-guy image, which was deliciously peppered with his philandering ways, Bond finally succumbed to the pupperty of his creators; Overnight Bond became a lovesick ninny!!

Chide me for seeking solace in familiarity, but some character quirks and traits, over-time become the defining soul of any character. And pardon me for saying this - but what's a character without it's soul? What's Chandler Bing without his sardonic sense of humor or Monica Gellar without her obsessive cleaning disorder? Likewise what's Indiana Jones without his swashbuckling ways, or Spiderman without his endearing boy-next-door image? And what's Bond without his ability to score with the ladies?

Voices

Have you sometimes wondered why silence can be deafening? I have been probing for this answer in the deepest recess of my mind for the past few days, and today is just one of them.

It's one of those days at work (a Mundane Monday to be precise), when the afternoon laze has descended upon us, and the only sound which threatens to break the silence is the mindless droning of the keyboard...The isolated voice in my head, freshly hatched from the idle hour, turns into an incoherent murmuring...Fratured thoughts provide more ammunition to the murmurings which turn into loud whispers..Once these receive the acknowledgement of the wandering mind, they gain enough momemtum to degenerate into mindless cacophony.....By now the jangle in my head is loud enough to be heard by my workstation neighbour...half-embarrassed and half-amused, I shoot a furtive glance in his direction to make sure that he didn't hear it, or even if he did, at least masked it with indifference.....

That's when the elusive answer strikes me, like the obvious waiting to be discovered; silence is deafening when the turbulence inside snowballs to such an incredible extent, that it threatens to break into the sanctuary of the surrounding calm

Destination GMAT!

It's the 18th of April, 2007. With a May 17th date for the GMAT exam, my adrenalin levels are at an all-time high.

Waiting evokes silly sentiments in different people. However, I am savoring every moment of this process, a tad bit more than my liking. For my sake, I sincerely hope that complacency hasn't crept in. Ironically, the mock tests haven't given me much reason to be laid-back. Even though accuracy is at an all-time high (just benchmarking me against me here!), time management is floundering. GMAT mock tests have been nothing short of shock-therapy. With each successive test has come a rude awakening; a realization that I might not be able to break into the elite, 700+ club.

Had I been a school-going teenager, these "mock challenges" would have demoralized me to an appalling extent. No more. It's not that I have transformed into an unflappable individual, unmoved by failings and challenges; in fact far from it. Neither have the stakes become lesser. It's just that I have been able to cultivate, albeit slowly, the rational seeds of detachment. Wish I can sincerely walk the tightrope between "rational detachment" and "measured involvement".

I have been wading through the stages of preparation comfortably over the past couple of weeks. Although I must confess that I hate being checkmated by SC (Sentence Correction for the uninitiated). They stump me. However, this too shall pass. I feel I am putting an honest effort. And in the end that does pay off...doesn't it?

Time alone will tell...