All I want is solitude

I honestly don't remember how I felt a few months back. I think I might not have felt great, but I had the drive to do things out of what I would consider my main professional role. I was taking courses, planning trips, writing/recording songs, and what not. On top of it, I was doing a series of satisfying/rewarding tasks at work, most of which involved teaching or helping researchers/scientists draft and fine-tune the textual representations of their life’s work. With all of this, I was able to keep up with the demands of rehearsals and gigs of a busy multi-instrumentalist.

On the personal side, I had finally put together bits and pieces of my domiciliary life and I seemed to be on my way to stitch them together into a dependable quilt that I could snuggle under when I wanted to. My partner, who was a pillar through the quilt-making process, and I were getting along okay, having navigated the tricky 7^th year of our relationship without much turmoil. I was enjoying cooking and learning new recipes. On top of this, I was actively considering the scope of continuing my academics—hell, if I can help people get their research perfected, why on Earth can’t I do it on my own? I made some significant strides on doing research on that as well.

Although I was never too social to begin with, I was still able to maintain a decent relationship status with my friends (almost entirely virtual—and there is no shame admitting that in 2019), family, and acquaintances. Social media was still relevant and useful, at least for sharing memes, practicing on being clever/funny, and keeping up with how people were framing their thoughts on things.

I don't have to dig too much to find enough evidence to suggest that I was a highly functioning individual. I might have been juggling a bit too many things at any point in time, but I don’t think I was messing things up too much. There were warning signs. The usual, “You got too much on your plate, and you will go on a tailspin sooner than you know it” type comments from people who cared enough about me and knew enough about my life was—which works out to a rounded one person.

Then—sure as honking in Mumbai—things changed.

Not sure exactly when. Maybe in October. Because that’s when I was officially transitioned to a managerial role at work, with some limits on the other roles that I was already doing. At work, there is always too many things to do and too few people to do them. This equation is a great template for someone like me to divert most of my energy/attention to doing things—not getting things done, as managers are supposed to do.

There must have been that evening when I thought that there were too many people craving for my attention. There must have been this one day when I found myself too exhausted to come back and work on a song. There must have been that one weekend where all I wanted to do was to sleep. There must have been those two weekday mornings when I could not fit in therapy. There must have been those days when whatever I seemed to cook tasted terrible. There must have been those two weeks where I didn’t want to meet the guy who was helping me with some documentation stuff. There must have been that month when I didn’t care to finish the last two weeks of a Coursera course that I have been paying for.

That brings me to me to now. I have stopped meme-ing. I have stopped interacting with people even on instant messaging and social media. I have not written something or recorded something in a few months. I have stopped wanting to meet my band mates for rehearsals. I have stopped working on my personal growth. I have stopped doing research. I have stopped meeting people, including the handful that I might have wanted to meet. I have stopped thinking about traveling to places that I might have wanted to visit purely because of scenic splendor. I have stopped wanting to be with cat. I have stopped checking for movies to watch.

The only thing I have not stopped is to finish things I have to finish at work and to do my live musician duties whenever they are called for.

My personal malaise for creativity has given me sufficient room for consuming others’ – which means that I have series like Better Call Saul and The Walking Dead under my belt. Probably not the worst things to spend time doing, but maybe not at the cost of not doing the things I used to care for.

I have never looked forward to being a manager, and I was not too sure how things would pan out. Going by the simple parameter of how good one is in delegating tasks and getting work done by others, I guess I’m a terrible manager. And going by how much torque is on my tailspin, I could bore a hole through solid ground and never come out. On the positive side, people are at work are aware of my state and are cooperative to look for ways to fix this. I hope to restart regular therapy sessions thanks to the insistence of my partner and my work manager.

I still don’t know when I will be back—if I will be back. Until this probable possibility becomes a reality, I’ll try to pull through another exhausting, creativity-less day at a time.

The first interview

Using a hastily prepared but decent looking resume, I went for my first ever job interview at a distinguished private hospital yesterday. It felt a little weird being in formals and putting on a show like an earnest fresher surgeon especially because my longish hair had been ruffled from it's preset position by the wet look look gel that I use due to the breeze during the transit from the apartment to the hospital.

I must clarify that I did not feel like I was faking the entire thing. A part of me still feels like a surgeon who can start working and perhaps make my way up. I would obviously feel much better if I had a tag of a full-time job working in a hospital. But the downpoint (in this position as well as most that are on offer in the private hospitals) is that I would have to work more than 100 hours a day with 24 hour shifts every alternate day. This would mean that I will have to forfeit my entire other life.

I'm disappointed to realize that I can't probably do 'work' in the field that I have graduated in while continuing my ambitious efforts in music. This has led me to the conclusion that such a heavy round the clock job at a hospital would have to a last resort. Right now, with a E-boi and Jay (from Noise Market) I'm trying to prepare a CV with which I will try to hunt for jobs in the music and creative fields. The next step will be something like a call-center job.

Today I am going to speak to a big music instrument vendor to see if I can get a job in one of their shops. Such a job has the advantage of giving me a lot of time with guitars even during work and probably meet a lot of industry persons. I am planning to start tutoring guitar soon probably at home too. It will be funny to try an explain everything to my parents as to why a surgeon should work in a shop and sell guitars. Ironic, it is.