CELLOPHANE

Tell me about yourself?....

I had heard that question in Mumbai after a whole year. I was so overwhelmed at getting an opportunity to speak that i got tongue tied and almost forgot my lines. The lines that would tell my story because it was mine. That would relate those bits and pieces out of the gamut and suspend the listener in a universe of very temperamentally selective perception. To create an obfuscating galaxy of a brilliant, incessantly inspired reality which would envelop the spectator, and rid my conscience of the melodramatic suffocation of its cobwebs, i thought fickly.

I sat for a job interview in the office of the CEO of a media company which was four times the size of my one room kitchen in a barren smelly corner of Yari road where sundays were dead. "Amar, have some water", he said. Yeah if water could solve this, then i'd prefer scuba diving right now. I wanted to say exactly those very words at that point of time. Maybe i'd get hired because of the wit, i thought. Then, suddenly, with an insidious, enthusiastic spurt, I decided to fix my gaze on this man. Eye contact- they wrote chapters about it in self improvement books. So i looked up and stared back at him to realise instead that his listless stare was already fixed on me. Though, i soon observed that it wasn't on me. It was somewhere far beyond me or my physical reality. Almost like he was sleeping with his eyes wide open. I'd unassumingly been gifted with a chance to think what i wanted to say, though i couldn't help thinking about the live sculpture sitting in front of me...If only i could've made this moment count with a camera. Just then, entering a moment of blinding desperation, i subconsciously shared a deeply rattling insight with myself.

Cellophane Instinct, i thought. This city had made of him just what it had made of me. We were both in a prison. In the present circumstances, it was just that his cage looked more attractive than mine. There was nothing natural about the way we behaved. Our minds were engaged in an intensely obliviated state. Everyone, regardless of who they were in this city or out of it, bore a maniacal streak. You had to watch carefully and you were sure to spot it. It was present in their most silent moments, in the cacophony of their minds. They couldn't scream out though, or they'd be forced out of the act. And you couldn't afford to be out of this act, this act of a city. You were nowhere without it, but the tragedy was that you realised that fact only once you reached that deadline you'd set yourself -to quit the act.

The man in front of me, Mahesh Mahalingam, was a tall, 47 year old Tamilian Brahmin. As he had thrown open his tie closet that morning, to choose a slight variation of the same blue pinstripe that made up a large part of the spectrum, his son had announced his departure from ‘their’ house. The rest was supposed to be in the letter he'd left on the dining table.A detail that he’d added in a sharp note, as he banged the French oak door behind him.

Mahesh had two children. One from a marriage that had broken a year ago. The second from a woman who was fascinated with the idea of being a beneficiary of his gene pool which she thought would be a surefire recipe for the success of her child.

 He had won the case in the court for keeping custody of his son from his legal marriage. And now his fears had come alive. He had been afraid of the dark as a child, and lonely stretches of road haunted him. Now he would have to wake up to an empty house for the remainder of his life. A huge two storeyed villa with French furnishings, brimming with shadows. Shadows with promises of desolation and despair. A mistress wasn’t a bad idea, he thought.

This man, sitting before him reminded him of a day in his life as a 22 year old fellow. However, it also reminded him strongly of his 18 year old son. Mahesh was a single child who was doted on and loved to death by his parents. At 20 he had been pragmatic, idealistic and a dropout. Immensely talented, and a potential multi hyphenate, he was exuberant, confident, yet nowhere in the material world. Jilted and hurt around the same time, by an older woman he was smitten with, he had later proclaimed to the woman he would marry, that he had arrived at a truce with himself and he loved her, though did not expect her to keep any expectations from him. She had agreed and he loved her motherly attitude towards him. Though over the years, he had forgotten to be a husband. Like a son, rhapsodic in the shadow of her grace.

And then he had fathered the ‘other’ woman’s son. He had reasoned with her in clear terms that the settlement would be purely one sided and he would just be a sperm donor. Though when his son grew up, she insisted that he share the financial burden of bringing up his child. She had accused him of beguiling her and as he later realised, secretly been in love with him. She had almost lost track of reality, and was tired of being a single mother.

And all this chaotic while later, this sort of retribution seemed far too bitter for him to swallow. Still, he wouldn’t let his faith falter. He was a survivor and would remain one. His parents had always admired that about him. And he had been a good son to them in return.

"Uhh I am a self taught photographer, i run a very popular blog, and i'm a trained animation artist", I started, sounding reasonably in control of the situation. "I have also been actively involved in a theatre production outfit for the past one year and have performed in Delhi and Mumbai".
    And your working experience? You wrote in your Resume that you have four years of work experience, said Mahesh. A blizzard of images ran through my mind...a five square feet prison cell, a dog chasing its own tail and an avalanche. 'How could i best explain to him that i was one of those rare multihyphenates who would be great at whatever they put their mind and hearts to? Honesty I thought...... answering honestly was the best way here. So i said "I started as a copywriter in an Ad agency, and got saturated so i was a graphic designer for a while after which i decided to turn to documentary filmmaking. And then i decided to use that experience in Production though you know how Indian Television is at the moment, so i left that and started working as a photographer for a travel magazine. While i was at it, i realised that i had no editorial control over what i was creating, so i decided to apply for the post of a visualizer, and i was loving my job until the man who was running the production house decided to shut down one fine day. So here i am". 
"Don't you think that's a bit too erratic, Amar"?, exclaimed Mahesh, widening his tired eyes.

'Wow! so i had just spent most of the energy that i had stored for the day to dedicatedly summarising my life to a person who didn't have any respect for my breath whatsoever'. "Well, I was being very honest with you", i said, and looked up at him.

He had the distant stare again, though he was looking at me this time. He was looking at me and yet looking somewhere beyond me. This man really had mastered the art. He should have been an actor, i thought. His dull eyes still displayed that glint of years of piled up angst. Enthusiasm that he had probably bottled away in a corner of his dark cupboard. An old Dramatics Society sweatshirt, maybe.

"I'd put it down as a lack of tact", he snapped suddenly. 

"Well, you can choose to do that, but its the work that matters at the end of the day", i said. 
"Amar" he began in a very unusual dreamy baritone, "I began by making rundowns on the second floor of this very organisation and it has been ten years hence and now i run this place. A concentrated effort speaks for itself. You need to pay a price for consistency. There’s no way you can possibly resist the irony of that”.

"I don't believe in compromises ....I believe in living life in all its splendour!”, i exclaimed.
"You sound like a hollow Hollywood film to me, but putting personal opinions aside, If you carry that attitude with you, you wouldn't be able to work with anybody in any organisation today", he said. 
An hour into this languid, uninspiring conversation, I'd started to draw up a phantasmal caricature of this man in my mind, as a survival strategy. I could not help feeling even more staunchly about my ideals than ever before. And then, it dawned on me like a premonition. I imagined myself waddling about this office nodding up every whim of this man's plagued mind a year from then.

It was time, i thought and i started in the most controlled tone i could muster " I think that i am capable of handling the job responsiblities of four individuals in your organisation. It would make my job easier, my day more satisfying and would be called an Economy of Scale by you while appearing in an interview by a prestigious news channel. Mr. Mahalingam, the post that you are interviewing me for, is actually below me in terms of my skills but i still appear at such interviews for lack of a choice, primarily because of a politics pursued vigorously by the group of management officials in your organisation you call the Human Resource management team. I refuse to put up with this any further"......I knew i had blown it even as i stared at his gaping face.

So i decided to tear myself out of this seeming gas chamber and make for the door. Even as i reached for the doorknob something made me do this. I turned around and looked at this man sweating it out in his airconditioned cabin within the layers of his expensive corporate attire, tailored to his needs.
"Have you ever waited to see the sunrise from the bridge over the sea that connects the city to the suburbs?", I said. His gaze which was already unflinchingly fixed on me , suddenly took a break, as if in a moment of sudden realisation. Huhh? he groaned, unwillingly.... "I have", i said, and left him with a smile as i closed the door behind me.

   

 Now really, when was the last time he’d felt the sun rise, thought Mahesh. He remembered letting the warmth seep in and watching it resonate in his wife’s caramel eyes that morning they had woken up together. When they’d conceived their first child. He had told her then, I’ll run away after she’s all grown up. I won’t be able to stand it. I know how men think about women. I can’t see her getting hurt. She’d laughed out loud and asked him, and what if we have a son? I don’t know, then i’ll probably run after he’s married or something. And what about us? , his wife had retorted calmly. He had just embraced her snugly in response.

Though he couldn't put his finger on where he'd lost out on me, that young man who sat before him a few minutes ago. It seemed like he was slipping into oblivion looking for the answer. He was finally in the quicksand he had been churning knowingly, all this while. But then, why was he in here. For the first time in what seemed like a prolonged age -Mahesh Mahalingam seemed refreshingly devoid of even a morsel of a word, even as he sat on his desk made of the finest Ebony, holding a Cartier pen between his fingers. The silence within was just beginning to devour him.

A week later, as i sat before the ambitiously designed french window in my living room, which was probably the only dignified source of ventilation in my apartment, there was a knock at the door. The courier guy delivered a parcel into my hand. I opened it to find my portfolio which i'd forgotten on Mahalingam’s table. Enclosed, was a recommendation letter by him and also an offer to join the organisation. I laughed and smelt the sheets of paper. They smelt of the black printing ink. There wasn't even a slight crease on the paper. It was a dictated letter. He had not bothered to hold it in his hand and read it even once before dispatch. I slipped the recommendation letter into my portfolio and posted the offer to join on my souvenir board. I went back to sipping my Chai in peace as i penned down the next caricature for a national daily. With enough money in my bank to sustain me for six more months, i was absolutely sure that i did not want to work with Mahesh Mahalingam.