MElancholy

As he lay prone on his bed, he wondered..'How many friends do I have?' The Deafening silence within his subconscious seemed to suggest what he had assumed all along. In the past few weeks He had begun, what he thought in his mind would be aptly called the 'Limitless project', taken from the movie of the same name, the thought had leaped to his mind when he saw how great one could become on ones own power if only he utilized all his god given potential.

"I'll do it", he thought..."then I'll show them all, all those people who still dont think I exist, those who keep saying we should meet,but would rush to welcome the first visitor from out of town, and treat me as though I was a fly on the wall."

"Well, you were, and you only have yourself to blame, said a tiny voice in the corner of your mind... you don't let go of the past, you hated your school life, you allowed yourself to get consumed with the trivial, and you lost sight of what's important. Your obstinate willingness to keep secrets is what has gotten you into this state.. it said..a little more forcefully now.Now look at you, alone..friendless, doing a job in your area of expertise for low pay and long hours, you bolted at the first sign of a long siege, when you could have at least tried to hold on back there... you would have finally escaped."

He sat up now, startled at the forcefulness of the voice...and retorted,"Look at it rationally, there was no way of predicting it, and this way, I'm self made, I did it myself.I didn't need anyone's help,or influence." he said as a sneer crept across his face,"besides, with the Limitless project.."

"Oh yes, that, how's it going for you,you're feeling sore and tired, you're alone, no one cares for you, people treat you like you're a washed up has been...you've written down your ideas, but you haven't solved any of them,that's your flaw, There's no way you can finish this project, because you're running,from what I dont know, you've dynamited more bridges this month than any other...You care so deeply for some that if you dont see reciprocity, you choose to withdraw altogether."

" Really? Then tell me how I can solve it, you see everything I've done as wrong...tell me how I can over come it, where is the solution?"

"You can be one of them, not both,you may become the best you there ever was, but at the cost of making people forget you completely, or compromise on it by going against yourself...you can be happy, or be excellent."

With that the voice fell silent, with a solemn look on his face, he made his decision, click, type, type, click click click click......

Stranger in a strange land : Part 1: Relearning & unlearning

In the months that have gone by, I had left the country to go abroad and learn something new. 'An additional set of qualifications , in the current economic scenario' or so I had been instructed to say, in the worst case at a visa interview. After spending close to a year and a half away, living on my own, earning my living money, and living on what I made. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, which was at the time, much deplored. In the meantime, the recession became steadily worse, and I came home to find employment. It feels good to be back, among familiar surroundings, or so I thought.

I feel a lot like brooks in the shawshank redemption, my country appears to gone and gotten itself in great big hurry. My home town is dotted with flyovers and construction projects which are supposed help in the future, but there seems to be no end in sight, with a lack of foresight that is staggering to this very day. Everyday I see the teeming masses trying to reach one of the now innumerable 'tech parks' around the city, and people fresh out of school or college, all of who seem to have forgotten how to speak English, thanks to the permeation of SMS/rap lingo.

Tattoos are now the norm rather than the new 'cool thing'.Everyone seems to want to or be in a 'relationship' whatever the hell that is, every association with another human is a relationship, humans are by default the only species to categorize and analyse these situations to death, and tinker with them based on a great double standard, Everyone wants others to change to accept them just the way they are.

A Job must be something people like to do, or so the movies tell us, why has the job been reduced to sitting in front of a computer all day? I think my designation has changed from Researcher, to Algorithm Developer, to Programmer , to now 'Man Who Runs Code'.Is this the real thing ? I wonder, if anywhere in the industry, time to market is the only prized constraint, then the word research becomes meaningless, surely a cockatoo with a strong enough beak or one trained to hop on the right keys can cobble together existing technology for a new product?

The real thing I have difficulty with is the language, academia interestingly, uses less complex and simpler language than the industry, even the most technical aspect of a job is described in the simplest words, however, words appear to have been soft-pedalled in most aspects, over time, and this is not just in industry, its the influx of management based lexicon into normal language which robs it of the chance to make an impact, sometime in those 16 months, brainstorming became 'ideating', problems, became 'issues',Holy hell! everything is an issue! Not going to the bathroom often is as much an issue as wearing your shoes, but only one of those is a problem. We have no more shoes or slippers anymore, we now have running shoes, trekking shoes, sandals,high heeled shoes, sandals etc.We have no more old people anymore, people are so afraid of age that they actually refer to others as ' 70 years young' , instead we have 'senior citizens', and none of them die, they 'expire' like magazine subscriptions, language and money are probably the best barometers of society, the minute either fails to have the impact it does or if either one is damned by the majority of people, it means there is need of a major overhaul in one way or the other.

As I write the movie 'wake up sid' plays in the background, I hear a voice inside of me saying 'wake up', I wonder if it isnt the medication talking, been sick the past couple of days.I guess I took the first step down overhaul avenue when I came home because I wanted to be like a fictional character. Fictional characters are so much more easier to idolize because there is very little you actually know about them and their circumstances.

Step 1. Eschew the aristocracy of pull, be self made>So far so good, my first job was through my effort and mine alone. I recognise however that to complete the transformation, I'm in need of a major overhaul (there's that word again ) in other aspects. Hope the recovery is swift enough to allow me that opportunity.