Author: Swati

Some questions are ubiquitous, aren’t they? You will find them everywhere – on survey forms/emails and feedback sheets in restaurants, hotels, and government buildings… you name it. 

One of those questions is: are you happy?

This is one of those questions whose answers are probably more varied than any other question ever! Everyone has something to say about this. We all have a take on what happiness means. 

Happiness, to me, is an ethereal concept. I don’t think I will ever be able to define it; I doubt I will even try.

I recently finished one of the modern treatises on happiness; I will not name names. The writer was eloquent. 

But I felt like I didn’t get anything tangible out of it. 

Happiness remained as elusive and abstract as it was when I started reading the book. I was not too fond of the feeling of still wanting. 

So, naturally, I turned to my eternally patient friends that bear with my impromptu weekly surveys. I ran a survey to understand what happiness meant to the sorted kind. 

I got various answers – depressing, philosophical, too philosophical, fun, and positively insane! 

Happiness is money.

Happiness is relationships.

Happiness is a handsome husband that knows how to cook.

Happiness is being excited for every single day of your existence.

Happiness is performance.

There were some great responses there. 

However, when asked what happiness means to him, one of my friends told me this with a straight face:

“Happiness is being able to pee when there is an urgent need.”

This answer is one of the closest I have ever come to understanding happiness. Very clear, concise, tangible – no room for ambiguity. 

My friend unknowingly taught me a crucial lesson that day. Answers to tough questions can be straightforward.

If we let them.

Every now and then, I get fed up with eating what I cook. In these instances, I sleepwalk to the closest restaurant, which usually happens to be where I have the entire menu memorized.

As the senses start springing to action one by one – I start preparing myself for an immersive culinary experience. My imagination takes me everywhere – the chef’s table, the sous chef in a frenzy, a scene from the movie Burnt, and even the feast from Harry Potter movies, where with a flick of Dumbledore’s wrist, the dining tables are embellished with all incredible delicacies. 

I am ready to enjoy every morsel of the meal that will soon be put in front of me. I promise myself that this experience will become the best I have ever had regarding mindfulness meditation while eating.

One quick bio break and I will be ready. My waitress is very polite; she quickly gives me instructions on accessing the washroom facilities. 

It could have been the wee drink I had at the beginning, but those instructions sound cryptic to me – take the stairs down, walk 500 meters on the first door that you see to your right, then take the third door that you see to your left. Walk another 200 meters, and then voila, the door you see in front of you is the door to the washroom. It opens with a code – XXXX. 

At least, that’s how it sounded to me. I don’t know whether she said that verbatim, but I felt too embarrassed to ask and confirm. She thanks me and leaves.

“Well, how difficult can it be?” I think to myself.

I confidently brush my ignorance aside and jump at this opportunity to undertake this hero’s journey. I take the stairs down and am faced with a bunch of doors with no markings whatsoever. For the thousandth time, I overestimated my sense of direction, more importantly, my IQ. I use my little understanding of mathematical permutations and combinations, and luckily in 3-4 tries, locate the said washroom.

This, as promised, came with a combination lock. I am trying to remember the combination, of course, so I try the most secure combination known to humankind.

1.2.3.4

Red light flashes, and a very off-putting beep mark my imbecility.

Wait, I should have known better.

0.0.0.0

Yes, and green!

Flashes of Harry Potter flood my imagination AGAIN. The door to the chamber of secrets did lie in the washroom; this one obviously doesn’t have snakes on the faucets, the sink, or the plumbing. I do not know parseltongue, so my hopes aren’t up. I couldn’t locate the chamber of secrets, unfortunately.

I do take the failure in my stride, though.

Next time, I will listen when the waitress tells me the structure of the maze to get to the washroom and take voracious notes.

Next time, I will take my phone with me. There is no way for me to know the True North otherwise.

Next time, I will carry my map and my wand.

OR

And the time after next, I probably will sleepwalk into a restaurant that has their washroom on the same floor, preferably not more than 50 meters away.

I was re-watching the famous sitcom Friends the other day, the episode wherein Phoebe attempts to teach Joey French to beef up his resume. 

Not only did he not speak French at all, he did not have any sense of what the French language sounded like. 

Je m’appelle to him was the same as blu-dee-blaa. 

Given how pathetic he was at it, it was not surprising that the casting agent saw right through the deficiency leading to Joey failing the audition.

Funny as the episode was, I had an eerie, unsettling feeling after watching it, which was immediately replaced by curiosity.

How many resumes out there would be padded like Joey’s? What proportion?

Some fascinating survey results came up as part of my internet search. Reference check companies found that almost 78% of the candidates applying for jobs had either lied in their application process or wouldn’t mind lying on their resume to land a job.

There was quite a spectrum to the lies, too – misrepresenting education, GPA, test scores, level of expertise in a language or a technology, and omitting a particular employer, to name a few.

It’s not easy for my little brain to process abstract concepts, so I made it personal. I assumed the role of such a candidate. I state I know french, but in reality, I am a level zero. 

For convenience, let’s assume the same proficiency level as Joey. Let’s assume, seeing my French experience; I get shortlisted for an interview/audition – which is in two days. 

It doesn’t take Einstein to figure out that it’s near impossible for me at this stage even to pretend that the situation can be salvaged – unless salvation means coming clean at the interview that I don’t actually have that skill.

Interviewer: Hi, I am a bla bla bla bla bla….

Me (wholly distracted, thinking): Oh my god! She is gonna ask me about my French language proficiency.

Interviewer: Tell me about yourself.

Me (thinking, I should come clean! Come clean you idiot, now now now): Hi, I am me. I am sorry, I don’t know any French. Sorry, I missed the question; what was your question again?

That is worse than a dream of being naked in front of a fully packed Wembley stadium. 

R.E.S.P.E.C.T for Joey! He had the balls to spit lies and then follow through with them. Although, his ignorance might have beefed up his courage there. Who knows!? 

In all that random searching and reading, I came across this quote by Stanley J Randall – a Canadian businessman turned politician:

“The closest to perfection a person ever comes is when he fills out a job application form.​”

Even the employer ought to know that noone is perfect.

There are some days that days and nights merge into one. Although most such days fall on the weekends, some fall on weekdays, the incredibly tiring ones. Ones where the phones would not stop ringing, the client wouldn’t stop complaining, your friends would all bail on you, all your assignments would be due, and the coffee machine has called it quits. You get the gist, right?

Although there is quite a bit wrong with days like that, they have a major silver lining. Sleep, with its arms, stretched out, waits to engulf you in its warm embrace.

You are floating in the dream world, weightless, before your head hits the pillow.

In the dream, your conscience is as clear as it can get. By a significant stroke of luck, you have run into billions- can afford a lavish lifestyle – holiday homes in all your dream destinations, all the shopping you had ever wanted to do. You eat at the best restaurants and have a date with some celebrity every evening. To top it all off, you are getting everything right on Jeopardy. The night just couldn’t get any better.

All your subconscious mind is playing for you is good dreams, a cluster of bliss as if to make up for the horrible day you had. Awww!

You are excited about the next episode of this incredibly awesome life you are living. This one, you hope, is bringing you the Prince Charming, your Knight in shining armor. What better way to sign off, than ride into the sunset with the love of your life for a Happily ever after?

It’s precisely the moment when some @#$%@# roommate draws the curtain in your shared room in the college dorm. 

And then there was light.

I love John Pinette and his brand of comedy- nice, simple, and elegant. It doesn’t hurt that so much of it revolves around food, which I am naturally drawn to, like a moth to a flame.

One comedy sketch of his is just the best – Get out of the line! Highly recommend watching it if you haven’t.

In bashing (in a very endearing style) the slow waiters, baristas, and budget customers, he mentions jumping behind the counters to work the fries just so the queues would move faster. 

“I have been the employee of the month twice, and I don’t even work there,” John Pinette says in his classic, playful manner while the audience guffaws. 

Now, I have been in one of those slow queues, way more than I would like, and every time I take a chance on the neighboring line that seemed to move faster up until the second I jumped to it, it freezes. 

Murphy’s law isn’t a theory, folks. It’s about as real as it gets. For people who don’t know what the Murphy Law is, here it goes:

“Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.”

Try any grocery store. Any store in a decent-sized town. 

Mr. Murphy was born to impress.

The image of a customer jumping on to stand behind the counter to serve is too funny AND complex for my little brain to process. A person such as that must really have a fire lit under their behind to be switching their role over from customer to employee. 

Not to mention a streak of control freakishness, some degree of samaritanship, and maybe a little altruism.

A minute ago, they had the easier job – hearing everyone list down everything wrong with the world – society, aging, control freak families, the age of robots, and long queues. A solid camaraderie that will last them a total of 10 minutes and 30 seconds, equalling the time of the wait till their turn. 10.5 minutes of free therapy right there. 

You get your groceries, and the relief from the mini go at the catharsis. Unlike the waiter at the nearby restaurant, they can’t pee in your soup. 

No blowback whatsoever.

And then assuming that there is a world where it’s a real option to jump behind the counter and work the fries, I wonder how many of those complaining activists from back in the queue would have it in them to do that? 

Even if they had the option, would they like to? 

Arleen Lorrance once said – 

“Be the change you want to see happen.”

I have major flaws, including but not limited to switching queues over and over despite uncountable demonstrations of the truth of Murphy’s law. 

But I don’t think you will ever see me complain, nor would you ever see me jump behind the counter and work the fries. I can’t seem to pick a side. 

So naturally, I turn to Henry Powell Spring’s sagacious advice:

The hottest places in hell are reserved for those, who, in a period of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.

Now that the oil is hot might as well work the fries.