Yeah, it's been quite sometime now. Well beyond the post-thesis period. And well-beyond the TIFR period now, as well.
That was quite a statement! Leaving a place where I have about a fourth of
my life is never easy; and I won't pretend it was. Somehow, I was in a dream buoyed by the fantasy world of Westeros by George R R Martin. This, at the very least, was a shock absorber. I was still in the middle of the second book when I boarded the train (after the customary see off by my friends; I wasn't sure if I should be happy or sad; and most definitely didn't behave in the way I had planned! Now, what did I plan? That's a secret!) And then back home, I got absorbed in the "family" way of doing things, which is, no matter how hard I try at poles apart from my life in TIFR.
So what is exactly the difference? Its not that I used to spend more time on my work in TIFR than here, though it seems like it is. There was a routine at TIFR: we used to go for lunch at 12:15 nearly always, and for tea always at 3:30; maybe where you'd go for dinner was something that could be changed at the last moment. And so there is a routine here: get out at 9:40 to reach workplace by 10:30, have lunch at 1:15 etc. The dinner option is not there (of course I can always my mother to prepare something interesting to surprise me!), and a considerable amount of time spent commuting, including some good amount of exercise in walking with a heavy laptop on the back! So at the very least, I don't have to worry about my exercise so long as I don't always behave like a glutton. It's just that these two routines are different, not in their nature but in their schedules. When I was very young, while thinking about why I wanted to do research, I convinced myself that it was because I could do it whenever I wanted. You didn't have to do from 10AM-5PM like in regular office. Now I know better: doing this involves a serious thought process, and unless you force yourself to develop this habit even while you are commuting, you have to do it the regular way! Of course, you can always work after you come back from office; but if you have a family, its gonna get harder. Still, as they say, when there's a will, there's a way!
Whatever whatever whatever ---- this wasn't meant to be a pointed post, so I allowed myself to ramble, but let's stop that now!
