The Proust Questionnaire

1. What is your idea of perfect happiness?
   A puppy date picnic with wholesome friends, cold beverage, verdant landscape filled with alpacas and cumulus blue skies, the smell of cut grass in the air, harp music, and the absence of fear and the recognition that we are all on this ship of fools together.
2. What is your greatest fear?
   Hurting or harming the planet or individuals while I deeply believe I am doing something good.
3. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
   Inability to cry. (exceptions: Disney movies) I need to see a therapist for this one.
4. What is the trait you most deplore in others?
   Selfishness, arrogance, lack of empathy.
5. Which living person do you most admire?
   Dr. Jane Goodall. The 14th Dalai Lama.
6. What is your greatest extravagance?
   I buy a lot of books. And headphones.
7. What is your current state of mind?
   Meh. Tranquil. Scientific. Juvenile. Masculine terrestrial. Precise but admirably balanced. Speculative. Calm and resourceful. Primitive. Egotistical. (Random states as I made edits to draft this text.)
8. What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
   Chastity. Perfection. Obedience.
9. On what occasion do you lie?
   Occasional, mild, and well-intentioned. White lies, social lies, lies to ease a situation or make someone feel better.
10. What do you most dislike about your appearance?
    I’ve got a skinny bum. Could use more cushioning.
11. Which living person do you most despise?
    I don’t spend too much time thinking about this.
12. What is the quality you most like in a man?
    Kindness. Moral Integrity. Sense of humor.
13. What is the quality you most like in a woman?
    Witty. Wild. Wise. With a heart for other women.
14. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
    Noice. Decent (in the voice of bubbles from trailer park boys).
15. What or who is the greatest love of your life?
    I love 435689307 things. But if I had to choose one: Krispy Kreme donuts.
16. When and where were you happiest?
    Floating in the lake with inflatable ice lollies at the cottage with Annamari and my pup Banksy. Midsummer 2021.
17. Which talent would you most like to have?-
    Play a musical instrument- well enough to jam with Indian Ocean.
    Or cook like my mother.
18. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? Morph into Jason Momoa.
19. What do you consider your greatest achievement?
    Being loved and admired by my dog. Having wonderful friends and a wholesome community of people that support me in life.
20. If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be?
    Marie Curie. Tove Jansson. Or a Klimt painting. Or a giant redwood tree.
21. Where would you most like to live?
    Maybe Finland or New Zealand. Or Auroville in India.
22. What is your most treasured possession?
    Aubade. A picture I took on a morning in May.
23. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
    Losing the one you love the most in the world.
24. What is your favorite occupation?
    I’d love to play cricket professionally. I admire teachers, storytellers, ecologists, activists, artivists, and curious academics.
25. What is your most marked characteristic?
    A good balance of optimism, cynicism, and probably a well-functional bullshit detector. I would also like to believe that I have strong immunity from outside opinions.
26. What do you most value in your friends?
    Humor. Honesty. Kindness. Wholesomeness. Weirdness.
27. Who are your favorite writers?
    Kurt Vonnegut. Douglas Adams. Shashi Tharoor. JK Rowling. Joan Didion. Tove Jansson. Kahlil Gibran. Richard Powers. Anthony de Saint Exupery. Devdutt Pattnaik. Bertrand Russell. Viktor Frankl. Satyajit Ray. Susan Sontag. Earnest Hemingway. Oscar Wilde.
28. Who is your hero of fiction?
    The dude from Big Lebowski. Rick Sanchez. Dumbledore.
29. Which historical figure do you most identify with?
    Rabindranath Tagore.
30. Who are your heroes in real life?
    My mother.
31. What are your favorite names?
    Earnest. Adele. Ada Lovelace. Noor. Noori. Rumi. Reva.
32. What is it that you most dislike?
    Printers.
33. What is your greatest regret?
    Dogecoin.
34. How would you like to die?
    Like the greek stoic philosopher, Chrysippus of Soli- death from laughter.
35. What is your motto?
    I’d quote Vonnegut here: “Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you’ve got a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies-” God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”

-Rahul Pardasani