My company is downsizing. It means they’re
deleting some roles they’re not sure they want to pay for. It started off with
salary cuts, longer hours and shorter breaks, but by the end of the month, they
decided they’d had enough, and started to simply shift-delete.
One of those roles they cut was mine, so,
as of the last day of last year, I am out of work. Not that it’s a bad thing.
I’m happy to be a stay-at-home sort of wife, taking care of the HubMan, and my
home. But the sting of watching all the other ladies in the block catwalking
their way to work refuses to go away. The surge of power of being an
independent in life is intoxicating. It has lured me to the workplace time and
again, if only to walk out in the early morn, looking employed and elegant.
And yet, I find I’m a very homely kind of
person. I cannot stand office politics, the pressures of deadlines, or the
annoying shades of fickle-minded managers. What I like are the smells of sun-dried
bedsheets, cooking up a storm in my own kitchen, taking time out for myself.
Time to write, to read, to pursue my own passions and to build a career upon
those passions.
So on my last day at work, I was quite
happy to give in my name-tag and sign-off for the last time. What followed were
two days of utter bliss, as the new year celebrations kicked in. The shower of
fireworks in the hazy smoke-filled sky signaled an arrival of a new me, a
stay-at-home me. It was a time for new beginnings, all over!
But then, Tuesday dawned, and the HubMan
set off for work, and alongwith him, so did an army of ladies dressed to the
nines. Wearing smart blazers, carrying chic purses, off they marched,
tip-tapping in their lovely office heels. The envy in me lasted until the last
of them had walked out of my sights. And then, the silence set in.
It was deafening, in all its quietness.
The sad thing about being a stay-at-home
person, is the quiet which comes along with it. For the majority of the day,
you find yourself alone. Especially in the metro cities of today, where
high-rise flats have increased the number of neighbours, but decreased the
number of friends, there’s no one to talk to during the whole of the day.
It brought back painful memories of years
gone by. Of the close-knit group in my old city, and the efforts I had made to
find new friends; efforts which had failed miserably when I found there were
such little avenues to meet new people. Of when I had moved cities as a new
bride, and found myself alone and friendless in a huge city. Of being in an
office campus of over a hundred thousand employees, and yet, not finding one
face in that crowd which could be identified as a friend.
More devastatingly, it brought back
memories of when I first moved to this new country. I had loved the role of
being a stay-at-home person then, too. And it had taken less than a month for
that silence to eat me alive.
That was when I realized what it was about
working that I loved most. The people, the noise, the constant chatter of a
hundred voices growling over missed deadlines and panic-inducing meetings. The
having someone to talk to when things became too quiet, or lonely. That was
what I missed.
My HubMan tells me I turn quiet when I move
places. I switch off that button which makes me, ‘me’, and instead turn
defensive and nostalgic about all the things I’ve left behind. He’s partly
correct. When I moved cities to be with him, I found myself missing even my old
company, despite the fact that I’d found a better role in my new one.
It’s tough moving to a new city. It’s easy
enough when you’re young and impressionable. Children make new friends easily.
But as an adult, a sort of barrier sets in, and you weigh each new person you
meet on a hundred different criteria, unsure if they would fit into the life
you have built for yourself. Sometimes you click, and new friendships are born.
Other times, you part ways after a single meeting. More than once, as I sat in
a crowded lunchroom filled with people sitting alone with only their cellphones
for company, have I thought, that the greatest need of the day is not Tinder,
or Facebook, where you search for dates and old connections scattered over the
world.
The greatest need of the day is to do away
with that silence, be it in the air, or your heart. To find like-minded people
in a new city. To find and make new friends. The day someone creates an app for
that, will be a happy day for all.
As I walked to the grocery store today
morning, the quiet on the road revealed a bird’s song to its mate. It unearthed
the soft footfalls of an elderly lady walking with her grandchild. The soft
signing wafting from the community club, and the squeals of children in a park.
And for the first time, the silence fought to turn itself into peace.
For now, I sit at my desk, basking in that
birdsong-filled silence, fighting with myself to not get stifled. Last year
with my move to this country, it had won, and I had faced a half years’ worth
of depression and anxiety in penalty. But this year, with two weeks under my belt,
not to mention last year’s experience on my stay-at-home resume, I just might
be able to conquer the quiet and find my peace…
It’s
not hard to face the world if I have a friend by my side. It’s not hard to face
the world with a foe along the ride.
But
ask me to cross a bridge alone, and you will find I fail, for the silence of
the journey is something my soul cannot abide…
No comments:
Post a Comment