Its all about Attitude…..

February 17, 2011 in Motivational, Story

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Part I

Rohan was organizing a workshop. Suddenly, his phone started ringing aloud in the workshop, frustrated, he picked up the phone. The caller being her didi, he expected the call to be short one, as she hardly talks more than required. To his surprise, it was someone else on the phone, and the call ended shortly with him uttering “Ohh shit!”, the words that he usually shudder from, much to speak aloud. Something was amiss or he had just won a noble prize!

Within 15 minutes of the call, he was on the way back to his maternal home. It was difficult for him to stay quiet, because he usually speaks too much which would make everyone wish that he  stops. Or was it the result of these people’s wishes that his tongue was tied and mind blank. Finally the painful and the boring journey of nearly 2.5 hours was about to be over. He wished it to be a dream.

He wished even more that he didn’t know the truth.

He reached the place of action. The store that his maternal uncle (mama) built about two years back – “The 2012 Departmental Store”. But it was much more than a store for all of them- whole family, something for which his mama spent years on. For them, It was no less than a child, who was just learning to walk on his own. About twenty years back, they started the shop inside their home, and now that small shop had grown as 2012 Departmental store, about the size of a arena that he wished he could play cricket in.

The “Dream store” now stood crippled in front of them, in ashes.

On phone few hours back he was announced that a fire had taken place which destroyed everything. He guessed maybe her mom was right, but only time will tell if everything was destroyed.

Part II

He stood there for about an hour and now he was shivering, though mostly of the cold. His thoughts came pouring at such a high rate, that he found them difficult to handle. With a bad habit of observing people and studying their moods, he got busy in guessing the road travelers’ “awe” at the mishap.

Finally, it was time to go back home with everyone and he was really pleased for the chilly winds were now turning unbearable.In the car he heard someone narrating that there was fire in the store probably due to a short-circuit. Second floor of the building nearly collapsed, the debris on the ground.The early morning was largely occupied with the fire fighting. And when the fire died out, focus shifted on removing the left outs (merely ashes) with an attempt to recover, if anything.

On reaching home, he could see people sitting circled in a room largely occupied with blankets and an unmistakable silence. Quietly, he went to his mother. Shivering, he was offered to make himself comfortable,therefore breaking the silence for a few moments. There were some exchanges about the store, and his mother’s sister started crying. His mother couldn’t stop herself too.

Others were not crying but they could any moment, and Rohan feared the moment.

He really assumed everything was over.
Ladies of the house were busy discussing the theories of sin, blessings version of hinduism and how the mishap could have been avoided only if there would have been some 101, or 1001 blah blah blah…. things that never interested him. It was a source of amusement to him whenever he wondered about how idiotic things tend to surface when people start discussing something like this. But this time neither it was no amusement, and nor he was in a mood to make fun of those people.All he could think was about the role of the God in the incident being a hearty believer in the supreme power.

Men of the house sat together, after perhaps their longest day. They discussed the losses and most importantly how to recover out of them.

Rohan felt that not everything was lost.

Next day in the morning he went to the shop. It was a real pain to get up at 8 in the morning when a few days ago, he was in a habit of sleeping by that time. But now he was back to his college. So waking up at 8 was a compulsion that JEE gifted him with. People were working to get the store running, he felt hopeful that within a span of few days, the store will resume its sales.

But he was yet to find what he missed last night, something that might make him feel not everything was destroyed.

Part III

After sometime finding no work for himself Rohan went back to home for breakfast. Things were no better except for the fact that everyone was busy with his or her work. Tension and anxiety could not have been more apparent. There was a chaos, though it was not easy to figure it out for the silence hid it. Leaving the store, he felt relieved.

Following it, he started coordinating some work, though this was not what he was supposed to do. He was there to monitor the work. Time was passing, but he wished if it could pass away faster. Alas! by now he was getting habitual of sentences like “I wish…” which he was sure would remain to be so.

Soon it was time for lunch. At lunch he got to know that his mama have said that he won’t have food unless he would be seeing the “2012 departmental store” running again which was now trying its best to distinguish itself from the ashes that surrounded it like a ghost. Rohan with his “he is the most knowledgeable person” attitude would have taken this decision as plain romanticism but now he had no sense of right or wrong.

It was about emotions, which hardly respect difference between right or wrong.

Trying to find himself a job with his cousin brother, he ended up chatting about their college lives. Rohan couldn’t stay quite very long. He loved to talk and once started, it was just impossible to shut him. After being asked to stand near the cash counter, he realized that he would have to stand there for 2-3 hours and alone. He recoiled back.

Part IV

Though for a lazy person like Rohan this should have been the easiest thing to do, but the thoughts running in his mind made sure it won’t be so. His mind appeared to be on a long trip, searching for endless horizons. After an hour or so, he saw a person with some banners in his hand. The unappealing banners exhibited “2012 Departmental Store”. Bored, he saw the person going up and realized the large banners were being employed to hide the aftereffects of mishap. With some efforts,the banners were placed, quite nicely concealing the fact that the place was damaged so severely just a day before. And finally he saw the words “Chalu Hain” (Its open) on the banner.

He finally realized what was going on. He couldn’t resist calling his mind back from its endless search journey and instead employing it to take the maximum motivation out of it. He saw the people’s “awwwe” getting converted to their “ohh” as if the store’s people (we) had lost their senses. They could be seen laughing, with their fingers directly pointed to the banner mentioning in bold words “2012 Departmental Store is open”.

And there started a new,spectacular wave of enthusiasm, an eagerness to combat your problems head-on. And the enthusiasm nicely resulted with a great work by all the people out there and consequently the shop being reopened for sale the second day after the grave tragedy, which otherwise destroyed everything but couldn’t dampen their spirits, their urge to rise.

What all matters at the time of any trouble be it small, be it huge, is your urge to struggle.
The stupendous team work can work wonders, besides providing emotional support to each other in the group.

P.S :

• What all matters at the time of troubles, is your urge to struggle.
• I am not a story writer, and this ain’t a story. I wish I have also inherited these qualities.
• Chaos only make the situation worse. Crying do help sometimes.
• I am confused over the role of the God, the silent spectator. Was he grateful enough to only hurt us this much and safely leave the rest for us to move on, or he was punishing us. Another nice interpretation is him teaching us to be more careful in the future.
• Sometimes word fails, and this was once such incident that rocked my life. I hope I am even able to transfer even the 1% of the motivation and the fighting spirit that the endowed me with, though losses incurred still cannot make up for them.

Tags: attitude, family, fire, incident, life, morale, psychology, relations, story