Monday, June 30, 2008

Taking that final step

It’s not easy. In fact, it can be quite frightening. For months I have been saying I want to do it, but now that I finally have, I am feeling rather woffly and unsure about having done it. This does not mean I am going to undo it, not even that there is any remote possibility that I am considering undoing it, but I cannot help being a little wobbly, almost like a downy little kitten taking its first tentative steps away from its mother’s warmth.

Actually, when you just read that wonderful piece of verbiage, you will find that it says very little except that I have just done something I am not sure I should have done. But I have done it anyway and will not be undoing it. Ergo, it needs to be considered to be irretrievably done and not undoable, not under any circumstances.

ANY? Well….maybe there is a tiny circumstance or two I would undo it under, perhaps if I was given the freedom to do what I am planning to do now that I have done the thing that I cannot undo. But since that is never going to be possible, I need to just grit my teeth and get on with the thing that I have been wanting to do, once I had the freedom to do it, that is, which is the whole reason for doing what I have done that I cannot, will not undo.

Whew.

I got the same feeling about two years ago, when I had my hair done. I had it cut short and, much to my own consternation, coloured it a wonderfully deep and dangerous purple. It was lovely. I was pampered and preened and primped and polished for hours and hours by my hair-expert and her crew, and I sat there falling gently asleep even as successions of nasty-smelling stuff were slathered all over my scalp, washed off and replaced with more. At the end of it, strangely exhausted, I tottered out of the salon, feeling more fragile than I had any right to be, but also feeling wonderful, with hair that glowed an almost iridescent violet in the direct sunlight. That this colour did not last was a given that I should have taken but didn’t remember to. I slowly went from deep purple to cherry scarlet to a cheap-bleached orange. And then, for the first ever time in my life, actually coloured by hair to go back to my natural, normal dark black.

Well, the story is just an analogy. My hair does not come into my undoable decision at all, except that I may now have the time to get it done again, though not the same kind of colour-adventure. You see, what I have done, which I am nervous about but will not undo, is to quit. Yes, you read right. QUIT. My Job. I gave in my one-line resignation letter a couple of weeks ago and have another couple of weeks to go before I walk out of here in, I hope, a little glory, if not an entire blaze of it. Where I am going to and what I am going to do remain between me and my mind (and, of course, Father and Small Cat if she has been listening in), but I have all my fingers and toes crossed that I will do it, and do it in a way that makes me and mine proud to be me and mine.

I will miss this place, especially the irascible boss and the people I work with, never mind their idiosyncracies and my own. But life is all about moving on finding new treasures, learning new routes and enjoying new adventures. This is my turn to do just that….

2 comments:

Ree said...

funny...i am here after ages and u r quitting...totally matches the afterthought i had a second before i clicked into your blog...luck ramya

Tithi said...

congrats! and all the very best! come to delhi for a longish holiday...