Predictable – Naah

Often heard parents complain that they can’t understand their children. “My kids are straying away from me and act more unpredictable by the day” and other types of rona- dhona that comes out effortlessly every time they want to make themselves sound like victims. My royal foot…on the contrary it is the parents who happen to be the most unpredictable and complex species on the face of earth. You just can’t say what makes them happy or sad and when!!!

I’ll cite a personal example. The other day when I wrote a good story for my column in Mid-day, my father, out of the blue, came up to me and said “You have my support no matter what happens, pursue whichever line of career that makes you happy”. Mannn… I felt so nice, he also added a line which made me immensely emotional….It requires a little background here…

I actually had joined this horrible class for MBA entrance exams called TIME, last December…it sucked more than anything I had ever witnessed, I would have given anything to escape those Maths sessions at 8’o’clock every Sunday morning.

I attended it regularly for 5 months inspite of the knowledge of how badly it killed my Sunday morning plans. But then things changed, the boredom got worse and my lectures in college shifted to 4-8 on Saturday evenings clashing with my MBA classes. That meant that I had to miss 50% of my lectures in TIME i.e. I go only on Sundays and skip the Saturday evening lectures. The other option was to change my MBA batch altogether making it 2 hours every weekday from 7-9 in the morning. For Pete’s sake that was difficult, even getting up in the morning and studying had never worked for me so going to class that early wasn’t even considered as a feasible option.

So I thought and thought and thought a little more. Finally I reached the conclusion that I am wasting my time doing MBA anyway. I wanted to be a journalist; MBA wouldn’t have helped me become one. I needed to get myself a PG degree in Journalism…ya that would be the wise thing to do. So I dropped out of the MBA class feigning much regret. But deep down inside I did feel extremely guilty as I had wasted 20 thousand of my dad’s money on those stupid classes which even while it lasted didn’t benefit me in any way.

Only if I had thought about this change in the career plan six months ago, I would have been 20 thousand richer and minus the monstrous guilt that kept soaring by the day.

Anyway coming back to the point…My father told me ‘Don’t feel bad about the 20 thousand you wasted on MBA classes…atleast now you are clear about what you want to do in life. I feel so proud whenever I see your name in Mid-day.” That last line was killer dude… nearly made me cry. Actually my father is just like me when it comes to suppressing his feelings and emotions. We’ll pull each others leg, fool around but just can’t talk about how we feel from inside infront of people, even close ones…and I felt nice that he was atleast making an effort. So I was on cloud nine for the next few days.

Recently the Diwali vacations started and I told him of my intention of joining a salsa class to pass time. The reaction was totally unexpected… “I am not giving you permission to join any class, I know what you did when you joined that MBA institute, wasting 20 thousand, do all this once you start working and have a fixed schedule.”

Working as a journalist and having a fixed schedule!!!…stumped me, I was always under the impression that the two terms didn’t go together. So I intended to fulfill all my dreams and desires for learning new skills before I fell into that full-time-work trap because people generally don’t have a fixed schedule or free time after they started working. At that time I stood up to him and made my point clear about how dumb his theory sounded, but subconsciously I was just recovering from the effects of what he said especially about that MBA classes, because I still felt guilty about it.

One hour later I was in double minds about whether or not I should go ahead with the salsa class against his strong wishes (read immature). I was in my room when he came in and said very thoughtfully, “You know that dance class seems like a good idea. You must always learn new things in life, after all this is the time to learn, later on you shall be loaded with responsibilities.”

For a moment I thought that maybe he was on drugs. Otherwise why would he contradict the very statement he so confidently made just an hour ago? Then I realized no, definitely no need for drugs there, this change of mind comes naturally to him. After all that’s the way all parents are and have always been, ‘totally totally unpredictable’