Mind diverts in its attention, the body tunes out, the soul
goes for a walk and the thoughts come in. Mind and Matter – thoughts seem to be
convalescing towards a concrete answer. An answer or maybe ‘the’ answer to ‘the’
question which will eventually be asked of any young upcoming professional
either by an interviewer or by a senior executive or the discerning ‘to-be-father-in-law’.
There are different variations like “what is your objective/ambition
in life?” , “what do you want to achieve?’, “where do you want to see yourself 15
years from now?” etc etc
I am yet to figure the answer to these questions and maybe
they smell of monism to me. But well, materialism is something that I am not
averse to, and hence it fits that I find an answer to these questions without
mistaking myself to be a saint.
My current make-up of the answer is – I want to make money
enough to buy myself an huge room full of books on a shelf. My short term objective is to make enough
money i.e disposable income, to be able to buy hardback books instead of buying
paperbacks! Go figure that out, Mr. Recruiter/Father in law/mentor/shrink (oops, did I spill out the beans?) ;-p
Look I started reading books because a family friend gave
a copy of Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven. It
was a hard back. Being reasonable lower
middle class in my schooling days, we considered books to be a source of
expensive entertainment. Buying school books at the beginning of the year was a
huge expense for which mom and dad had to save up months in advance. So the
reading was limited to Enid Blyton borrowed from the school library, borrowed
from a friend or found in the local old newspaper seller’s shop. When other kids used to buy old copies of
sportstar and filmfare, I was hunting for Enid Blyton – usually search was on
for a hardback !
As years rolled on, borrowing continued but I had moved on
to Hardy Boys, Jeffrey Archer, Mario Puzo and R K Narayanan. Still there wasn’t
enough money to buy them. So I started permanently borrowing them from some old uncle’s or aunt’s collection.
I still have some of them. Must mention some ‘adult’ books that I ended
up borrowing, unaware of the thrills
buried inside those pages – my first experience
of adult literature in teenage – uufff, those were the days of innocent gratification
!
Pursuing an MBA, I started buying some
business/management/marketing related books that were a good read even after
the studies were finished. Realizing the ‘high’ I was experiencing ‘owning’
those books, I started buying books from my first salary. I was always against piracy and hence ended
up buying proper editions. Over the last few years I have built up a decent
collection of books. Each time I get promoted or get a hike in salary, my disposition
towards the buying of books increased. The more I earned the more I bought. It was
as if I was measuring my success in terms of the number of books that I bought.
But hardbacks were still out of reach.
Sister’s wedding, a house, a car, a bike, etc maybe prevented me from getting those voluptuous
hardbacks. Excuses ? Maybe.
Hence now that I have a chance to think of ‘the’ question – I
realize that I want to earn more because of the necessity to buy myself
hardback books. Life seems going towards
that ambition – a hardbound eventuality !
