The flipside to watching a movie like Moneyball is that you begin to expect comebacks in life. You begin to think that your dwindling fortunes will turn around, when everyone around you is getting shortlisted for one company or the other. But it doesn’t happen. And every time it doesn’t happen, there’s this ensuing cycle of retrospection, self-incrimination and doubt. You begin doubting yourself because suddenly you are just half of what you used to be. The advantage of being a decent b-schooler is also its biggest disadvantage. And then there’s the discomfiting doubt of growing older with every passing second. Add to that the absolute lack of a restitution period, and you have the unenviable task of taking it in the chin and moving on, almost immediately after. I could draw parallels between the Fastrack advertisement and our lives here, but it is much easier said than done. The problem with being a human being is, you tend to be sentient. We will inevitably over think every omission and every defeat and end up beating ourselves over it. The difference is maybe you won’t show it, while I will. And then, one fine day – you find your name in the list.
You are beaming and apprehensive because you think you are not a total klutz, and you have no tangible clue of what to expect. You ask yourself, ‘What now?’ There’s a slight error with your resume that you can’t tell your PlaceComm about, because it’s a direct infringement of their directives. There’s an equally flustered looking classmate who has been shortlisted for the first time. And here’s the kicker. You have to wake up at 6 in the morning tomorrow.
The kneejerk reaction is, using Google. That, it’s the most commonly visited webpage, is not fiction. Google provides direction. And an alibi, especially when your parents might have crept up behind you and you managed to save yourself a major loss of face by anticipating this. God save you, if you didn’t. After an hour of going through the financial statements and the relevant webpages, you end up digressing to their videos and learning more about their social networking than their mechanics. That’s the point when you ask yourself, “Okay, so what profile have I been shortlisted for?” It’s alright. Add to that the usual hyperboles in your resume, that you have absolutely no inkling about how to rationalise. (I did send my resume to my cousin for a proof reading, and I distinctly remember grating laughter that lasted one whole minute.) So, now what?
Now you have your dinner, listen to Phil Collins and go to sleep1.