Message in a bottle

7th May 2020

Hey there my younger me.. 

Here we are. 2020. You're probably just putting down that Abdul Kalam book as you pick this up. The book was nice. Somewhat fanciful, but knowing what I know now, it had it's heart in the right place. We'll give it that. So did life turn out like what Abdul Kalam thought it would? Simply put, No. If anything, 2020 India feels more like Indira Gandhi's India than Vajpayee's India. 

But we're not here to talk about India, rather to talk about you. 

Yes. Let's talk about you, and how everything turned out. I won't tell you about the exact events in your life (where's the fun in that??), but more about what you take out of it. 

On the whole, life will be pretty good. Believe it or not, your angry temper will not be what people know you most for. Barring the odd eruption, your tongue won't get the better of you. You'll even get a handwritten compliment which says "Mr. Calm". Imagine that!! And that won't be the weirdest of things.. For all your struggles in your engineering college, you will be best known in publicly for an academic achievement.  You will learn to trust yourself that things will eventually work out, and that will be half the reason for your angst to calm. 

And that's because the other half (or should we say the better half??) will be the girl. 

Which girl, you ask? Why that same one!! The one that you eagerly wait for every evening as you take your dog out for his nightly round, and hope to time it exactly with the her filling up drinking water from the society water-tank. The one that you do not dare to ask if this is anything more than just friendship, for the risk of losing those precious 45 minutes of your day. Your life will have a purpose and there will be meaning to everything you do. Almost all that turns out good in your life, will stem from her. All because even today you want to be a better man, just for her. 

And then there's the kids.. The two most adorable Darwinian success stories one can imagine. They will be your biggest satisfaction and your biggest dread, all rolled in one. Everything else you do and achieve, will pale in comparison to the feeling you will get when you tuck them in for the night, as they are secure in the feeling that you are there for them through the night.  

As with every high, there will be lows too. You will come face to face with irreparable loss, and have to figure out a way to deal with it. Loss that everyone has to face, but there's no troubleshooting guide on how you can get out of it. You'll muddle your way through it, but as you deal with your own loss, you will lose sight of the troubles that others in your life are facing. Unfortunately you will not be there for them when they need you the most. And worst of all, it will be too late by the time you come to your senses. 

Career wise, it'll be an interesting journey. You won't be too low down the food chain, but you won't be as high as you would like to be either. Like Abdul Kalam, you will be known for an "achievement" which basically involved being at the right place at the right time, and everything you do thereafter will be an afterthought. You will see up close the mendacity of phrases like talent and ability,  but you also won't fight hard enough for what you want, for fear that you will end up as something you don't want to be. Or at least that will be your excuse. That, and the realization that there were more people who would rather be in your shoes than the other way around. 

Your dreams won't come true, but what does come true will be beyond your wildest dreams. Like you won't be the writer you want to be today. But you will take some writing classes which will force you to reflect on how lucky you have been. 

Life, in short, will be net positive. 

Your older you..