Since 2020 is on the verge of wrapping up, it is time to bring out those breathless gushy epochal pieces.
So here goes mine!
Truly, 2020 messed up a lot of stuff.
But all the powers to be made sure that educating the ignorant didn’t stop and there was no break in the academic calendar.
Nor did those work meetings.
A Googly, make it a Doosra, was bowled at us by Godji and we had to protect our sanity-stumps.
So we ramped up our game, simply added the fourth pillar to the three pillars of essentials.
Roti Kapda and Makaan had a brand new sibling - Bandwidth! But trust me this new essential was so iffy, sometimes it stayed true, and most often it failed you right at the crunch time, mostly when you were about to make a sweeping statement.
‘Buffering’ became the bugbear of every meeting.
Just imagine, you being frozen on multiple screens of the attendees with your mouth wide open, eyes half-closed with index finger suspended midair!
If you survived the ‘Pehla Padav’ of good-connectivity, you had to learn about the perfect camera angles to showcase your mug, so that you didn’t look like the distant aunt of your much-filtered profile picture, giving rise to ‘Woe Kaun Thi?’ in many minds! You finally understood why Pajamas are truly forgiving and in the end what really mattered is good lighting and a half-decent white shirt.
And if you didn’t have the time to airbrush self, the laptop with its video and audio off, represented you at the monthly mashup. Actually, everyone did the same, thus every meeting was a ‘resounding’ success!
One kept the fingers and toes crossed hoping that when you were called out to share your pearls of wisdom, you did hear you were wanted, and your errant children or half-covered/disheveled husband didn’t meeting-bomb you, landing on your video feed quite unannounced.
Being ‘well-heeled’ was passe, bathroom slippers became your calloused feet’s best friends
If the meeting timings of both the spouses plus the progeny’s coincided, it was mayhem in the making as all the parties searched for safe nooks and corners which had decent connectivity, privacy, and kosher backgrounds. Else there were serious cross-connections; Bosses and teachers had a field day eavesdropping on unintended conversations and kitchen-gossip
Evocative-Background morphing was a lifeline in case you were too tired to spruce up the much-lived-in surroundings. Though I fail to understand, why do all inner-views of celebs happen in front of a bulging-at-the-seams bookcase? To flash and embrace tightly thy inner-erudite perhaps?
Also, never in my adult life, have I been asked to keep quiet as much as it happened in the past six months, whenever the family members’ meetings rolled out that is!
Sheesh! You are never world-famous within your humble abode! Or as Barack Obama rightly said, ‘You are never a Prophet in your land!’
As mentioned earlier, education via online classes became the new norm!
Yeah, tell me something new, you might say.
But this new norm, if you examine the social dynamics closely, has given rise to some well-deserved laughs and newer social constructs.
If a morning class of an institution started at 9 am, the attendee-child could often be found brushing around 8:59 am. Heck maybe even at 9:15 am with the teacher blasting on at full volume with the child attending furiously to the more pressing matter of pending Insta messages.
In the case of younger ones, some dripping-with-affection-from-every-pore parents have been found feeding the highly reluctant children while the teacher droned on about the French revolution. And if the stars weren’t too favourable some unlucky students got guillotined for not submitting that cut-copy-paste homework on time.
Sometimes the teacher had to take a break for private matters as well. Seen that video, where the teacher let go at Dolby’s stereo, and the toddlers rolled down laughing?
(See it here. Viewer’s discretion advised )
Adding to the daily zoom call stress, if not the breakfast chomping, Bluetoothed, furiously roaming, on-a-across-country-call spouse - who forgot that phone had to be mobile not him - it was the calm waali Bai who often class-bombed the teacher’s show, with her broom, duster, and other weapons of dust-destruction.
She came, she surveyed and she went as and when she pleased! No one could mess with this powerful being. The cribbing and carping parents were an easier lot to handle.
We all adjusted and understood. After all, it is the story of every home!
All said, most adults couldn’t fathom a dilemma called thy teenager!
One who was bursting with energy after a binge-watch of 9 hours was completely exhausted, withered, and shriveled after an hour’s lecture!
After the completion of a working day, it was always wise to leave the teenagers alone, till they were ready to communicate with earthly you. Else if you got unduly adventurous and asked them, ‘how was your day?’, trust me this was a harakiri in waiting.
Hear me when I tell you, for all the times, you have been told that you fell way short of the ‘Motherness-Meter, there is a time-tested mantra, that pays rich dividends.
Secretly photograph your teenager attending the online class and threaten to upload it on social media tagging her/him, with all 1000 happening hashtags.
But this mantra has its pitfall, firstly the teenager should allow you to follow him/her! Still, Hope floats!
Finally, as a mother, I might be the victim, but as a tutor, I always have the last laugh! When I’m asked for my opinion, I go unplugged!
AJ wants to know if this attitude of hers is in violation of the Geneva Conventions! If it is, well, 202Won is on! Amen!
Comments