Beginning of The End

“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans” – John Lennon

It is the beginning of the end. I say this not only with a tinge of despair in my voice but also with lots of fears unknown. And when you have the end in your mind you gain a wholly different perspective, it’s like the ship which is about to conclude its journey, suddenly lot of things begin appearing on the horizon. Some things are a surprise but I think most things were to be expected if not welcomed.

Such is the journey now, an eventful 21 months are about to draw to a close and I’m having trouble to comprehend where the time flew. Though some may think that this ranting and raving is a little premature given that there are still 5 months to go before the end, but as I said I now see the end. It’s like a long chain of events although seemingly causal and predictable in nature but truly random and happenstance in real, which have brought me to this point. The cocoon is about to burst and the moth is full of dread!

No matter how much stories do the rounds of the gruelling schedule of B-Schools and the pressure and rigor during the course I still the think the outside is much more mean than this college ever was. This is not to negate the fact that B-School life is tough and you do learn a few lessons, and the hard way. Approximately four month down the course after a strenuous and humiliating marketing class I said to my friend that I think I have had enough of this MBA and now I just wanna take a job and get out, something he had been saying from day 1. And now that time is upon me and I’m like a fish out of water now.

When I came in this place like everyone else I was a little worried, little hesitant, little too keen to blend in and little unsure that will I blend in. But like everyone else I carried blind optimism, confidence and a fire in the belly. But maybe not like everyone else I also carried inside me a silent promise that I will not let this time be like my engineering. So I studied hard, did my work, attended my classes and sat up straight like everyone else. But I did something which I had never done before, whenever I did it I felt like someone who’s trying to get to know a stranger. That wasn’t me, I was this whisky drinking, party loving, bike driving, junk wearing long haired dude who was thrust in with someone who wore suits, kept his hair short, studied in the evening and tried to ask intelligent questions in class. Lame or plain as it may sound I was the fire in me, for me. I thought I was changed and the new ‘Me’ has finally arrived, But alas! I guess bad habits have this uncanny knack of sticking to me, they are like this big huge sphere like earth which attract me towards it and that is my final resting place.

Drunkard, free rider, lousy, carefree or anything else what people call or at least jest fully call me now I am not actually good for nothing. I was the guy who cleared NTSE, 11th ranker in Bansal entrance exams, cleared IIT screening twice, IIT JEE once, and a respectable 98 percentile in CAT. I am also someone who knows how to play a guitar, somewhat a Harmonium and the Drums, how to skate, the plays and sonnets of Shakespeare, the entire discography of Aerosmith and Metallica, the history of rock, contemporary House music, a Physics whiz kid, an amateur DJ, an amateur Bartender and someone knows an engine like the back of his hand. But I am also someone who flunked 4 subjects in engineering, scored 44 out of 100 in 12th boards maths, missed exams because I felt like drinking and slept through my own farewell.

I think the following misquote from Gregory David Roberts sums up it most appropriately –

“I was a revolutionary who lost his ideals in alcohol, a philosopher who lost his beliefs in self pity, and a poet who lost his soul in the rat race.”

All my above ranting only alludes to the one fact that every time I look towards my life in the hind sight I see a different something each time. But when I see towards this End, there is singularity. It’s like the event horizon; nothing that has happened before it matter when you reach there, and nothing that is there can reach you, indefinitely.

And I can’t help feeling that everything now is temporary, everything that you did or are doing are just leading up to that point. Nothing is going to go beyond it. So there is going to be lot of turbulence and lots of things that were will remain no longer, the best allegory is a battle, everyone will not survive but you still have to do it. I now have sleepless nights, feelings of despair and sense of urgency for something I can’t really place my finger on.
The rat race in on! And my most dreaded words like CV, certificate, short list, and package are back in the air. It’s the final lap of the race and winners are about to be decided. I got to run too and that worries me, the more I worry the lesser work I do and the lesser I do something about it the more I am worried about it. It is the worst of vicious circles. I’m in a strange state of mind, think weird things and act oddly and nobody near me understands why. Soon there will be a mad rush for jobs, for money, for big companies and fancy titles, long time friends will fight in GDs and every coveted job will come with a barrage of abuses. Everyone’s worth will be decided by his final placement.

Once more time to pack up my life and move. This life and this world that I helped shape, the world that I’m a part of is going to end, and a different world is going to rise. I just need to decide what to take with me and what not. The end is upon us. And it is the beginning of the end.

P.S.- When I re read this post today I realized how weird it sounds. But hey, it's a momentary lpase of reason!