Right now, I’m 20 years, 4 months and 11 days old.
People tell me how lucky I am to be so young, to know that there’s so much left for me to experience, so much to explore and learn. “Sharanya, this is just the start!”
I listen to them and in that moment I absorb the excitement, I feel like I was born just yesterday. I feel that buzz, that thrill of knowing that I’m steadily approaching a period that will open me up to a plethora of choices and opportunities. A period that will let me start over and put behind the trivialities of student life. A period that will also monitor my biggest decisions and freeze them for the rest of my life.
I’d think that latter part would warrant some Oh-My-God, Knees-shaking, Lips-quivering, Eyebrows-scrunched, Nail-Biting, Breathe-in-Breathe-out moments.
But strangely that fear hasn’t set in yet. I don’t yet consciously know that the rest of my life is being shaped right now. That the mistakes I make right now will stay with me even if I identify them and never let myself repeat them again. That simple, straightforward interest and talent don’t have enough power to dictate your life. I’d want them to, but they don’t, and they never will.
Talk to me about Genetics and Neurons and anything at all that involves Biology, and my eyes will light up. I will feel the adrenaline rush; I will listen to you like you had Gerard Butler’s face, Chandler Bing’s sense of humor and a British accent…when in fact, you might sing like Anu Malik and look like my worst nightmare.
I had the interest, I had the grades, I had the passion. I lacked the guts.
Medicine will now remain a lost dream.
So will Bharatanatyam.
So I let my insecurities get the best of me, and moved towards the world of media.
3 years at Sophia College- A Professor who changed my life, an H.O.D who showed me the true meaning of respect, some pretty awesome friends and undiluted happiness.
I try to remember the kind of person I was back then. I don’t remember all the details, but I remember how restless I was. Like every minute had to be used up unproductively- doing wild things, laughing over a classmate’s latest hairdo, Saturday nights at Firangi Pani, clubbing at Play, Pyjama parties at Dakshita’s, cheese magi, attending a Parikrama concert late into the night and working on a Marketing project immediately after, trying to write a sonnet on the perils of writing a sonnet for Ms.Canteenwala’s lectures, debating over the atrocities of Advertising and Popular Culture for Lavanya’s life changing lectures and just making a bloody big effort to live every moment like it was our last.
They basically told us stories about how work life would suck the happiness out of our lives, drop by precious drop, and we bought it.
I’ve spent 3 months working for an Advertising Agency and I want to sell back everything I bought. Bullshit. Codswallop. Trash. Untrue. Its 2 am on a Saturday night, and I’m home. I’m writing this and I notice that a lot of that restlessness has left me. It’s not because the happiness has been sucked right out of me. Its because I’ve grown. I’ve settled into a different way of life, things have changed. Saturday night without a drink or Bandra or Marine Drive or dancing doesn’t feel like a night wasted anymore. Saturday night at home, with pizza and a rom-com feels nice. It feels comfortable. It feels happy.
So I didn’t get to be a Doctor or a dancer. So I’m working long hours and messing up and pulling my hair out. But I’ve never felt so optimistic or heady ever. I keep telling myself how blessed I am to be earning at 20, to be meeting new people and forming a bond that cuts through the ages, to be responsible for something beyond myself…Change is good.
Yes, there could be many of you grumbling over work and how cruel it is to you and your social life, but I think a lot of it has to do with what we’re made to believe as we grow up.
I will not let my kids look at year 21 in dread. I will not feed them the disappointments and the shit I went through as I grew up. I will let them form their own opinions.
I will be 40 someday, and still feel like I was born just the day before. We’re always waking up to new things, we’re always leaving behind the old ones. Bring yourself to live past the regrets, and you’ll realize that life truly is beautiful.
