Poornima Manco

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values

Failing forward

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We all know what kind of year it’s been. And I will not use it as an excuse, but I will admit that I have failed rather spectacularly at what I had so ambitiously vowed to do at the start of 2020. For those who’ve come to my blog a little later, here’s the link to my very public proclamation – New Year, New you & all that jazz.

Now, I had said that shopping has always been for fun and for fashion (for me), but this year it became my bit of frivolity too. When, with each passing day, all one read or heard was doom and gloom, I cheered myself up by buying a dress (or two), several lipsticks, some gorgeous shoes, and well… you get the idea!

In my defence, none of this is throwaway fashion. I made all these purchases intending to keep and wear these items for several years. Also, when I dispose of them in the future, it will be to a charity shop and not a landfill. However, even while I write this, I feel a twinge of guilt, because I had absolutely no need for any of these things I purchased over the year. I have a full to bursting wardrobe, outfits that range three sizes (for my fit to fat phases) and enough makeup to do over the entire cast of ‘Phantom of the opera’. Still, a girl with a credit card, an Instagram account and a desire to make herself feel better through any means possible, can end up doing a fair bit of damage to said card. I won’t even go into the psychology of what shopping came to embody in the year that never was. This was the chicken soup for my soul. Shallow, I know, but true.

So, as we near the end of this particularly horrendous year, I stand before you, a bit shame-faced, and quite rueful in not having followed through on my promise. However, with just a few days to go, I don’t see any reason to not want to try again. At some level I recognise that shopping is only papering over the cracks of anxiety, uncertainty and fear. It’s momentary joy in an unpredictable time. It’s comfort consumption, a crutch to handle that which there is no handle on. And each of us is ‘dealing with’ in our own unique ways. But equally, my original intent of doing something for the planet hasn’t disappeared entirely. I am still very cognisant of the fact that pandemics aside, our planet is groaning under the weight of our consumerism. And while I may have stumbled and fallen at the very first hurdle, I can still pick myself up and finish this race. With three days to go to 2021, now may be as good a time as any.

After all, in the immortal words of Scarlett O’Hara, “Tomorrow is another day.”

 

Half of a lifetime

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Today is a pretty significant day in my life. I haven’t tom-tommed about it everywhere, in fact not even my nearest and dearest know, but I have been thinking about it all day long. Today marks exactly half my life of being in Britain. This was the first day, all those years ago, that I entered the United Kingdom with a work visa in my hand, stars in my eyes and trepidation in my heart.

It was meant to be temporary, no more than three years and then I would’ve transferred to Hong Kong. Three years seemed like a very long time, but here I am, more than two decades later and it seems to have gone in the blink of an eye.

I am a naturalised British citizen now and very proud of the fact too. However, somewhere within me, an umbilical cord still binds me to my birthplace. I miss the seasons, the colours, the clothes, the food and most of all, my family and friends who still remain in India. However, Britain has given me so much as well. I have my own family here, I have many friends, my job, my hobbies, the freedom to be who I want to be, to reinvent myself, to be fearless and experimental, all of these are boons granted to me by this land.

I cannot lie though and say that everything has been smooth sailing. Adopting a new country as your own and adapting to its culture and norms can be quite terrifying. Even being fluent in English wasn’t enough at times, because my accent wasn’t right. The Indians here weren’t like the Indians in India, and I had to learn a new subset of behaviours and beliefs. Similarly, with the Britons, I had to understand that it could take years before acceptance and true assimilation could occur.

In all of this, I have learned to grow, to evolve, to change that which needed changing and hold on to that which I refused to change. My value system is Indian and will continue to be so, but my outlook has broadened enough to see the fault lines in what I left behind.

What would I consider myself today? An Anglicised Indian? I think not. The world is shrinking at a breathtaking pace. Not in terms of geography, but certainly in terms of connectivity. I am fortunate enough to have travelled to many parts of the globe, and if there’s one thing I can say confidently, it is this: I find myself falling in step with a country and a culture almost seamlessly, even if the language, currency, food and features are palpably alien.

Hence, even though I detest labels, the one I would most identify with at this point, is that of a global citizen. A hokey sentiment? Maybe. But one that feels most true to who I am today.

All those years ago, when I left home to pursue my career ambitions, I had no idea where I would end up and what I would end up doing. In twenty-odd years, I have lived a life I could only have dreamed of. A life filled with love, laughter, happiness, sorrow, career highs and career lows. I have been delighted to discover some wonderful facets to myself and been equally dismayed to find that I am also chock full of flaws. I have become a wife and a mother, I have become a teacher and a writer. I have travelled the world and I have retreated into superlative books.

If I am fortunate enough to have another few decades of life left on this planet, then all I could ask for, with humility and gratitude, is more of the same.

Decisions, decisions…

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Doesn’t life seem to be a series of decisions sometimes? Good ones, bad ones, little and large ones, accidental ones, subconscious ones and well thought out ones too. Yet, at the moment of decision making, we have no way of knowing what the consequences of that decision will be. Sure, you can probably predict that if you don’t take a shower for a week, you’ll stink. So taking a shower will be a kindness to yourself and others. But my point is more about those decisions that may end up having far reaching consequences.

This came home to me quite recently in the conundrum my daughter is facing. The prospect of beginning University has been a daunting one. For the past year or so, she has been banging on about taking a year out before submerging herself in academics again. A gap year is not a huge deal in Europe. Most students take this time out to go travel the world and figure out what they want out of their lives.

However, I won’t lie, it scared the bejesus out of us! What if she decided never to return to studying? What if, in the process of finding herself, she found herself a boyfriend in a different country and settled down there? What if she went completely off piste doing this gap year malarkey? Quelling these doubts and fears has taken the better part of the year with many persuasive tactics from her, and many many chats with colleagues and friends whose kids have done the same.

In the end we decided that it would be no bad thing, as long as the year was structured and productive. Friends came forward with offers of work, we researched ways she could travel and where to, and the prospect of having our daughter not resent us for forcing her to do something she didn’t want to do, suddenly seemed quite pleasant.

Autonomy can have an interesting side effect.

Once the ball was in her court, she started to truly ponder the consequences of taking that year out. The major one being that she would be that much older graduating, and therefore, her work life would also begin that much later. Whilst most of her peers are taking up the various University places being offered to them, she would fall behind by a year. How would that work out?

Even as I write this, no decisions have been made. A part of me feels really sorry that at such a young age, children have to decide the course of their lives, at least academically. But all of us did it. Some well, and others not so much.

Shortly after finishing my GCSE equivalent in India, while I was still prevaricating about which courses to pick for my A levels, I remember my head teacher telling my father that I should do ‘Arts’. I was a natural fit for the Humanities stream, but for some reason, the ‘Arts’ students in my school were considered the dumbest of the lot. (A terrible injustice, but an unconscious bias that was fostered quite strongly). Neither my grades, nor I, were suited for any of the Sciences, so, much to my dismay, my father insisted that I study Commerce and Accountancy, with a side dish of Higher Mathematics.

For all the people who knew me then, and who know me now, can you see a square peg fitting into a round hole? That was me everyday, for two years of my life. If it wasn’t for some good friends and some understanding teachers, I don’t think I would have managed the marks I did, scraping through with B’s and C’s.

When it came to University choices, once again my father deemed that doing a diploma in Travel and Tourism would open up many opportunities for me, career wise. Thank goodness for that kind soul we encountered, a former patient of my father’s, who showed him the light by saying, “Doctor sahib, why are you forcing your daughter to do a diploma when she is getting accepted into a prestigious BA English (Hons) course?” Sometimes it takes someone on the outside to point out the obvious.

Trust me, I am not resentful of my father’s decisions on my behalf. At least not now. I understand that he did what he did, out of love and concern for me. However, it made me doubly sure that I would never force my ideas on my children.

As parents, it is our duty to guide our children. If we’ve done our job right and instilled the right values in them from the start, then this is the time we need to loosen those reins and allow them to make their own decisions. Hopefully, they’ll make the right ones, and if, Heaven forbid, they do make the wrong ones, nothing is completely unsalvageable. Their safety and their happiness should be our paramount concern. How they get to their destination, what path they take, linear or circular, is completely up to them.

In the immortal words of Theodore Roosevelt:

“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.”