On Way Back Home…

On 14 April 20 evening, the reluctant car owner of my house agreed to let me drive in the evening. I don’t undermine his concerns which were valid- 1) it wasn’t essential, so why to go out amidst lockdown and 2) I still don’t have a driver’s license – put together, it was enough to irk a disciplined Army man. But I pestered, who won’t need a change after day long of twiddling thumbs while looking at names against black background on screen also hearing unidentifiable voices during back- to -back online meetings on zoom and ECHO.

Eventually, I got the car keys, pressed an icon and the unlock sound squawked suddenly, shattering the lockdown silence in my society premises.

Left foot on the clutch and right trying to handle the break and accelerator, reverse gear, they say is the most difficult one for a beginner. Few meters back and then rolling the steering right in first gear, I paved my way through the most challenging window towards hitting the road, the boom-barrier, just before the main-gate. Its angle really confuses me and I thank God each time I successfully pass through it. Even though mundane, for me it was important to describe the process of hitting the road for two reasons- I wanted to show off my knowledge of driving (comes naturally to all beginners) and second- doing something that we are forbidden to do has its own charm. Moreover, when so many people are still being asked to go to offices while facing the same risk as anybody going out, then lets assume that I was also driving back from office.

I had driven hardly for few minutes and on a sliding road, we heard someone screaming from behind. They were two men holding an airbag with each of their hands on both sides and walking slowly against the weight of the bag. My husband asked me to stop once he heard the voice. Since the car was on a slope and in order to slow down, I switched on first gear, it stopped. I tried balancing the accelerator, clutch and gear but as soon as the right foot was lifted from the break to touch the accelerator, the car was sliding backwards. In the meanwhile, the two walking men had reached us.  Sense of Moral Policing awakened and for once I thought of lecturing them on how irresponsible they were that they were not staying at home to support the lockdown. However, before I could start, one of them said ‘sir, please Punjab jane ke rasta bataiye. Jo rasta mujhe pata hai wahan se Police nahi jane de rahi’ (sir, could you please help me with the direction from here to go to Punjab, the route that I know has been barred by Police’. And then he informed us that he is a cook in a restaurant in Gurgaon. During the lockdown like all others, the restaurant where he worked is closed. He was hoping that the lock-down will be lifted tomorrow (15 April) and managed for past so many days in whatever money he had saved. But since lockdown has been extended till 03 May, he is completely broke and has barely anything left to survive. All that he could think of was to go home- that’s the only though that comforts him and nothing else.

I was saddened when I heard this man. While I was working on COVID-19 specific and sensitive messages for Migrant population all day long and had heard about strategies to help them and read advisories for Migrant population, when I actually saw one narrating his story, I thought ‘does all that we were doing, addresses what he just described?’ Will you, I or anyone in his situation have the bandwidth to abide the rules of the lockdown when our bodies are battling hunger-pangs? Will we care to pay attention to maintain 1 meter distance when all we are longing for is a caring touch of a loved one? I don’t think so. We will perhaps do the same as this gentleman was doing, pick our bags and start walking aimlessly until we find a way back home. Nonetheless, we hesitantly offered him some money with the disclaimer that its not out of pity but for our own peace of mind. He hesitated but later accepted it reluctantly. He started walking again with one handle of the luggage in his hand and the other in his friend’s.

Meanwhile, successfully managing to pull the sliding car up on the slope, I applied first gear and slowly shifted to second and reached the main gate of our society. Accepted the boom-bar challenge, reached parking, reverse gear and then first. I parked, stopped and the lock sound of the car once again squawked, shattering the silence of my society that evening.

Getting back to the question of Bread and butter!

To all those who work and love their jobs and even those who pretend to do so, how would you like it if you are given a leave of 1 year with all the time in the world to do whatever you like to do?

Well, I am sure many of you would think that it would get boring after few days and that you would desperately miss your work, but trust me, nothing of these happened to me. I was enjoying my life to the hilt during my leave. I was dancing on the head of a sulking neighbour as her roof happened to be my floor. I was merrily driving my husband’s car while he kept his fingers crossed until I returned to his sight with his car in one piece and I was mastering a foreign language and rehearsing hard, enough to take the revenge of the last lost fight him. I was also enjoying this network of young people called toastmasters club of New Delhi, playing late night quizzes and was getting a hang of ‘Pysche’.   

One fine morning of March second week, I received a call from my boss asking about my well-being. I did the customary ‘All is well’ and his next sentence made me a wary woman. He asked if I can rejoin active duty 3 months before the joining date? As you all know, such questions are veiled commands when they come from bosses. Thanks to the 19^th virus from the COVID family that recently took birth. I was asked to let go of 3 months of my Special Leave. To explain, I work for a UN agency – UNICEF.

With this, I started mourning the end of the fun times- the stomping of the neighbor’s roof, the tyranny on the husband’s car, the revenge act with foreign language; I was made to pay for all of that. I started imagining my life after office restarts and trust me didn’t like it at all. I had started delivering mental eulogy to all of my favorite things which to me were even dearer than Maria’s ‘raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, white mettle kettles and warm woollen mittens’. The grief was visible on my face and obviously the husband had to ask. Well, he has been trained in 6 years and how. With utmost empathy on his face while dancing with happiness in his head that God has granted him his wishes, he asked, ‘why do you look sad my dear?’  And I broke down. I said, ‘you see, now I will have to let go of everything that I loved doing during my leave- my dance, driving, Spanish, toastmasters meetings…. I don’t feel good about it. I don’t want to go back to work before the designated date.’ Successfully hiding his glee and simultaneously imagining the good times coming his way, he consoled me as I cried.

Stress clouded my mind starting the evening of 31 March. After long, the sense of going back to school after summer vacations did rounds. In the morning, I didn’t feel like waking up as if I had entered a new era of gloom. With a feeling not less than that of being befooled, I re-joined work on 01 April 2020.

Few calls and zoom meetings down, I thought that coming back to work after a happy break of 1 year wasn’t as bad as I had imagined it to be. Thanks to the lock-down, I was working from home. I attended 5 zoom meetings on COVID-19 on the first day of work and wrote 3 observation notes. Could still had my share of fun by putting husband to work by making him write some of those three. And not only that I also wrote this chronicle the same evening. I went for an evening walk in the society premises successfully evading the spy cameras of the lock-down crusade. At the dinner table, I told my husband. ‘it was a good day’. Tomorrow, I will restart driving.