Life update

Today I complete four months of joblessness. Time seems to have flown quite quickly. Looking back, I don’t really know how I spent these months. I think I read quite a bit. I chilled out a bit. Slept well. Ate well. Hardly travelled. Hardly got bored. One one hand I’m happy that I didn’t get bored for most of these four months. On the other hand, I believe I’ve wasted these months sitting at home.

I spent a considerable amount of time trying to figure out what I wanted to do in life. Professionally. Unprofessionally. There were no easy answers to this question. Every time I thought I had the answer, something would happen which would make me change my answer. I have spanned the entire spectrum just in a matter of days. Thought about some stuff, only to discard them only a day later. Nothing particularly concrete came of of this time.

My joblessness is going to end next Monday, the 25th. I’m moving to Gurgaon. I’m yet to book my tickets, but will probably go there on Sunday. Once I find a house and settle down there, there is a very good chance that my mother will join me there. Bangalore will continue to be my “hometown” but I’m not sure if it’ll still be home. Yes, I’m getting uprooted.

The popular saying is that most people have two careers – they do, on an average, two kinds of jobs in their entire careers. The saying also goes on to say that “successful” people have an average of four different careers. I don’t know what to make of it, but I’ll be starting my fourth job next week (counting one internship also as a job). The new job is “orthogonal” to my last two jobs, which were mutually orthogonal. The new job is slightly in line with my first job (the internship) but the similarity is slight. So, at the age of twenty five, with a total working life of a little more than two years, I’m entering my fourth career. I don’t know if I’ve “achieved success” because of this.

When I was a kid, I used to read Misha. I still remember one cartoon from that. A hedgehog stands under an apple tree, and wants to get the apple. It shakes the tree. A few leaves fall off. It shakes the tree again. A few more leaves fall. The penultimate panel shows the hedgehog shaking the tree really vigorously. The last panel shows the hedgehog covered with leaves from the tree. The fruit is still up there. Based on this, my father used to “do a hedgehog on” me. This treatment involved him catching me by the shoulders and shaking me vigorously back and fourth, well at a faster rate. It used to be fun. This treatment has since been extended to all kids who have cared to visit our house.

For a large part of my childhood, it was common for me to go up to my father and say “make a hedgehog out of me”. And he used to proceed to give me the “hedgehog treatment” that I’ve mentioned above. Finally it seems like all those requests have come to fruition. In the lingo followed by the financial industry, people who work in hedge funds are called ‘hedgehogs’. And starting next Monday, this set is going to include me.

7 thoughts on “Life update”

  1. You seem to have a long term memory. Like you, I remember lots of my wonderful childhood anecdotes. I don’t know if I make sense. But I wonder if certain kids grow up with this kind of strong memory, if their parents make them work hard religiously at a young age so that the memoirs remain deeply rooted to such kids ? I feel this perhaps might be the case, because I too underwent a lot under my parents strict regimental up-keeping.

    I too read the Russian stuffs thanks to Nava Karnataka publications during my child hood days. Did the ones you read had certain peculiar smelly pages ?

    1. no no
      no smelly pages
      nice glossy material. and cheap. no clue about the navakarnataka publications.

      i don’t know if memory is a function of how hard you work at a young age.

  2. this wouldnt happen to be a certain tech hedge fund based out of new york would it?
    How’s life man. Long time.

    Beedi

    1. this is a tech hedge fund based out of Gurgaon. indian markets.

      yeah long time. last we spoke was when we met at cedar in jan i think. life’s ok.

  3. Hi Srikanth,

    I have been reading your blog from the LJ days. You write pretty well and although I am a Bangalorean (a non-adventurous one), you helped me discover some good places (eatouts). I was planning to join you on one of the photowalks but fate willed otherwise. Good to know that you are moving north for a better career. Wish you the very best and may the (fourth) job be a very fulfilling one.

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