I've been busy...

Been a long, long time since I wrote anything... anything except the Economics, Finance or other term papers (well, there isn't much I can write there anyways!). What stimulated me was a chance meeting with an old friend yesterday – in the cyber world – that’s the only place where friends meet these days unless they share the same workplace, but I digress…. So, this friend asks me a question that only someone who has not met me in years can ask. He goes… “So, what’s up on the creative side these days? Writing? Painting? Music?”

Hmmm… Is that me he’s talking to? Oh, yes it is! Ages back I used to write stuff… though it was more for ‘Galaxy’, the school magazine. I still have a couple of paintings ordaining the walls of my bedroom at home - testimony to the dream of a Picasso-in-making gone sour. And I still remember the ecstasy when I could play the complete song “Tujhe dekha to yeh” from DDLJ on my guitar (which now lies somewhere with a broken string… hoping someday it will again find its C-majors and D-minors).

So, where did I lose all that? There’s got to be some explanation – it wasn’t as if I lost interest. Oh yes, there it is. I know what happened. “I got busy! I did not have the time!”. Precisely.

Let’s take a moment and get a perspective on this. “I am busy!” Isn’t that our answer to almost everything in life these days? I got busy as soon as I moved out of the walls of my school… and I’ve been busy ever since. I got busy studying to get into engineering college – which anyways, took me three years instead of two. For four years, I was busy sitting in the parking lot or the canteen of my college, waiting for someone to hand me my degree. Then, for two years I was busy drinking coffee and checking emails all day at work. And now I’m at Business school, where… screw it – you’re either supposed to be busy or dead! Heck, I WAS busy!!!

Just a small question keeps pricking me, though. Was it worth it?

I kept myself busy doing things that came by, gave me a moment of happiness and then moved on. I am no longer designing engine components… I am no longer writing software codes… I don’t think I ever again will. And I was busy doing these for six years. But, I do wish I could still paint a sunset. I wish I could play the guitar for my friends. I wish I didn’t have to scratch my brains out looking for the right words while writing this. I wish I had taken a moment to talk to that friend who I’ve now lost forever. I wish I had held on to the hand that reached out to me, but I was too busy to grasp it. I wish… I wish I had not been busy.

Well, I hope to make amends. And that’s why I am writing. Maybe to get rid of the guilt of having lost my interests, my passions, the people and things those were most important to me. Make no mistake… I’m still busy. I’m busy like hell. But I guess I’ll always be. And so, I write. And I hope I’ll stick to it this time… or else, someday when I meet you, I’ll say…. “I used to paint, I used to play the guitar, and yes… I used to write blogs!”