Rightly or wrongly, I judge people by the value they create. And this is not necessarily about making money. The housewife who is bringing up kids well is as value-creating as the CEO of an organisation. Even someone who is truly working for a social cause is creating a lot of value regardless of the money they earn. End of it all, I feel that creating value equals spending your time well or productively.
Today, after a long time, I actually took a Saturday off. I’ve been dying for a two-day weekend for the last six months, ever since work became really hectic. Finally I got it. Today was the first half of that much coveted two-day weekend.
I did absolutely nothing productive today. And that too, by design. Got up late. Sprawled in front of the TV for most of the morning. Didn’t even shave (had a bath though). Ordered in some food while watching a DVD. Visited my grandparents with the kids. Came back and slept for a couple of hours more. Now planning to go for a late night movie with Smita and Tisca, a friend.
There have been days like today earlier, when I have ended up feeling guilty about spending a whole day doing absolutely nothing. Weekends normally come and go in a flurry of activity between kids, shopping, prayer meetings, friends, etc. But all of these are about time being well-spent. Maybe I’m fooling myself, but I surely stay occupied most of my waking hours.
But strangely, I don’t feel guilty about today at all.
I was brought up by my grandparents ever since I was 2 months old. It is a fact that I did not even know my real parents till the age of 8. That is the reason why I call my grandparents Aai and Baba – what we normally call our parents. My real parents only used to visit over weekends and obviously they would shower their weekly quota of affection over just two days, making them a lot more fun than most real parents. I have been a fortune child in the sense that I have had the love of two sets of parents in my childhood.
Baba is now 85. Aai is 83. I met them today after almost 6 months. I think of them every day. But I never end up meeting them. There are several reasons. They stay a little further away, out of my everyday commute. I don’t get the time to meet them even over the weekends because weekends are hectic too. I think of calling them very often but end up not doing it because they cannot really hear too well over the phone.
Today I went and met them.
I think today was one of my most productive days. I created a lot of value today.
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2 comments:
I have a 75 yr old Grandmother...haven't seen her for years...I remember her often and think about the stories she told me
Most of my vivid imagination has been passed down to me from my grandmother's genes. The perils of having working parents meant my lazy summers as a child were spent in her lap, listening to her stories laced with fantasy and moral values in equal measure...the fantasy remained, the morals eroded over time...
...funny isn't it, how one's earliest memories are embedded so deep...deeply burnt in the chip of one's brains...and one still cannot but remember one's dinner from the night before?
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