diff --git a/source/_posts/2012-10-25-not-that-anyone-cares.markdown b/source/_posts/2012-10-25-not-that-anyone-cares.markdown new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e94e683 --- /dev/null +++ b/source/_posts/2012-10-25-not-that-anyone-cares.markdown @@ -0,0 +1,32 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: "Not That Anyone Cares" +date: 2012-10-25 17:13 +comments: true +categories: +--- + + +Perusing the notice boards in the departments and the hostels is a useful habit well-cultivated by many on campus, perhaps on seniors' insistence and their own observations regarding the importance of the information that the notice boards usually carry. I am not a perfectly regular notice board-reader but I was standing there, nevertheless, scanning long sheets of shabbily clipped paper, for something significant. A breach of the code of conduct here, a hijacking of disciplinary marks there, a warning for participation in a hunger strike here and a suspension order for misconduct there.
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+I checked again to see if it was true that there was nothing else the department wanted me know at that moment. My doubts had been well-reasoned after all. There was going to be a conference on advances in friction welding. Exciting, surely. I mean, I remembered how heroic I had felt donning that threadbare apron which I was sure was older than I was, those sooted gloves that would have been an unmistakable fit for Mr.Sultan Kosen if manual welding ever struck his fancy, and going bzzzzz...over Mild Steel to make a butt joint. If I had had more confidence in the safety of the dingy advanced welding(which is more accurate and automatic) lab, I would have easily slept through the practical or something. Naturally, I was just thinking about the other notices and this one just made want to distort the whole notice board, with the welding torch, if possible.
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+We used to have McRennett opposite our school. For the most ridiculous of reasons, the school administration decided that we should pass up a chance to have the most delicious cakes in the world(it's been years since I had my last, but, believe me the taste lingers) after school hours. We weren't allowed to go. Of course, when rules become cold, they can be forgotten and indifference to them can be forgiven. Everyone started frequenting the bakery again but I wouldn't go for a while. My excuse was always the same. I would say that I am not one for answering uncomfortable questions if worse came to worst and some teacher chastised me. For the record, that never happened. My school had a set of unbelievably kind teachers. Despite being busy with churning out maximum marks in the board exam, my school did give each one of its pupils pleasant memories to cherish.
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+Back in the day, I would have been simply disgusted by the prospect of explaining to anyone that I didn't visit McRennett to steal glances at those immature kids from the boys wing or to exhibit unruly behavior towards the bakery-keepers to impress said boys or whatever else the school thought people would be up to in the bakery. I never bothered to find the real reason for the ban. When the ban was active, I wouldn't be caught dead with a McRennett plastic cover, not for the fear of getting caught, I would argue, but for expressing my disapproval of the conservatism and the sore narrow-mindedness this rule represented. Call it childish, cowardly , silly or whatever you will, but I used to think my rebellion against unnecessary rules was sticking to them obsequiously all the while holding a huge grudge against everything responsible for bringing them about.
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+Years later, nothing much has changed. If you ask me, a single, teetotaling, unassuming, altruistic , docile girl, going about most things in a most businesslike manner, whose idea of adventure is limited to   stealing after-dinner joyrides to grab an Amul Butterscotch Tricone from CBRI wouldn't be expected to worry sick about rules none of which, heavens forbid, should be connived at making her blameworthy, even a long time later in a galaxy far away. But, if you think so, you are not preparing for the worst, counting your chickens before they are hatched, excluding Murphy's law, ignoring hindsight bias and blunting Hanlon's razor. You just have to be scared. They send you email warnings; big brother is watching you with eyes narrowed to slits, Lord Vader might just strangle you with the force should you be dim witted enough to apologize for a little slip. You should be shivering, thanking with trembling lips, every kind bead of sweat for cooling your body which would be annihilated in the heat caused by the terrible, the awesome.
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+Now, I am clearly lost. I thought I would wax lyrical about an ideal world that barters respect, deals in professionalism and appreciation, where there was no one breathing down your neck and an infinite reservoir of  mutual funds which are not the ones that are subjected to market risks and require you to read the offer documents carefully before investing(I bet you still didn't read that fast enough), but the unspoken, unwritten investments of very adult-like(excluding the hypocrisy) trust that put paid to all feelings of doubt in the worth and means of even a third person. But, then, what actually happened, was these winds of boredom suddenly got the better of the incessant twerp that I am usually, giving these ideal world discourses and self-proclaimed-Galadriel-style-gyan to anyone from unsuspecting, self-centered morons to omniscient old pros who smile encouragingly just to be polite . In all brutal honesty, I realized that if you believe things are out of place and are too namby-pamby to be a Kejriwal, you should be content with fake approval of everything unless you fancy speaking up out of turn and well above your station, in which case, you would be taken as seriously as Senator Jar Jar Binks.
+Seriously, Complaint boxes,letters to the editor and feedback forms are for the inept. They are instruments of false reassurances, effective means to appease a harmless, powerless minority who care while cunningly duping them into believing that they are causing a change. Why, the jellyfish won't dare to come up with anything more radical anyway.
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+An unintentionally long P.S.
+Forgive me, pre-exam times leave you with twice as much an urge to do half of what you always thought twice about doing, put off for later although they would have been twice as fun as leisure activities, as those you had ended up otherwise engaged in, doing twice over the other half of those things which would have made you balk had you known you would be feeling even half the regret you are now feeling especially since you are thinking up a set of things you could have accomplished that would have now made you twice as productive(I am talking about systematic study) and halved your current amount of work. That's what, I didn't blog about this when I thought I was free enough to
+and it would kill me not to, but now I did, when I haven't started studying for the exams that are ominously close. While I would have liked, a more patiently written blogpost, acing the exams, a star-wars marathon _after_ the exams, I am not sure what I have now or will.
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+ +Nisha C, III Year, Mech + diff --git a/source/images/mail.png b/source/images/mail.png new file mode 100644 index 0000000..68ec3e3 Binary files /dev/null and b/source/images/mail.png differ