The First Thing I Shall Do After Lockdown
Recently, I asked my 3-year-old daughter, “what would be the first thing that you want to do after the lockdown?” Without giving a second thought she exclaimed “ Pani Puri “. Her answer was pretty much expected because she loves Pani Puri and also, what is life without street food?
I probed my daughter further and reminded her that the whole family has been cooking some great delicacies ranging from homemade cakes, chaats, dosas, and clearing Wishlist of zillion years since the lockdown began. “Are you not bored of eating?”, I asked. She thought and nodded, reminiscing the stomach ache a couple of days before. “So, we will go and see the next minion movie in the theatre!”
“Me want Banana” I said, signaling that I am also looking forward to the next minion movie date with my girl. But then I asked her, “what about the daily doses Ramayan, Mahabharta, Peppa Pig, Hotstar, Netflix, Prime that you currently get? Are they not enough?” “Hmmm…I think then my answer changes to playing in the park with you”, she replied.
When she turned 1 year old, it was our weekly routine to visit a park nearby on Saturday. We would go on every swing, ride the see-saw, run behind squirrels, count bird, and get dirty in the mud. We use to look forward to that day every week. However, I continued to question her. “Doesn’t Papa get to play with you every day on the terrace. Passing the ball, running with all toys, hide and seek?” Now she replied with a grin, “you only want to question more or want answers too?” and left the dining table, leaving me alone with my quest of the millennium.
After realizing that I have spent a lot of my time with family during the lockdown, my attention turned to work. Work will be the first thing which needs to be sorted and much of the loss of work time needs to be recovered. But, when I dug deeper (i.e. in the timesheets), I realized that I may be spending lesser hours on work, but those hours are superbly effective. There was no more daily office gossip, never-ending meetings, unwanted attendees, obligatory luncheons and unnecessary travel. Therefore, more time was available to dedicate towards training, the long-pending draft of office policies, and the actual execution of work. Then, what is the one thing that I miss during the lockdown? Catching up with Friends.
I have not met my circle of friends in a very long time. Chitchat with coffee and Cheese Maska Bun at any cafe in the city would be our weekly rendezvous. Oh! I miss those long conversations even though we have conversed over video calls. Furthermore, I have been able to connect with some of my friends who I only dreamt of talking to again in this life including my school classmates of ’04, college crowd of ’07, soulmates of Hostel time.
The more I probed, the more I realized that I love this lockdown time. I have had the time to reflect, do a course correction, bring parity in work-life balance, and become more effective. I am doing the things that I always wanted to do: conversing with old friends, making foods at home, gorging on books, training the office staff, and more.
While I do love the street food, café outings, detour to the park, movie at the theatre, office buzz, the absence of these things have given me some space to rediscover my habits during the lockdown.
Therefore, the first thing that I will do after lockdown gets over, is to make a list of things I did during the lockdown and inculcate those during my daily routine.
The time which has been given to stay inside is actually the time given to see inside you. Therefore, I will exercise daily, have a more effective work environment, business travel will be the exception and not a norm, playing with children will not be only a weekly affair, learning will be a continuous activity and not a one-time thing, and I will keep probing myself and my daughter with stupid questions. These are the other things that I will do once the lockdown is over.
Naman Shrimal.
Originally published at https://thewiseidiot.in on April 23, 2020.
