Eye of the Tiger

I sat through five seasons of eight episodes each of the wonderful serial The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel aggregating to almost thirty-three hours of viewing time spread over months and found my spark in the penultimate episode…. after thirty-two hours. In this episode, Mrs. Maisel’s father, Mr. Abe Weissman, goes to his six-year-old grandson Ethan’s school to attend to a parents' meeting. The principal takes the parents and Mr. Weissman to a large room where she declares that children are working in various groups in line with their aptitude that was determined by an examination conducted. Mr. Weissman walks around to see Section One where the children with aptitude towards architecture are working together to build a model of a large hotel.  The next group of children are the ones with an aptitude for mathematics. They are trying to solve problems within a given time. The third section is where the teacher announces that these children have an aptitude for science and are building a model of a spaceship. 

Mr. Weissman is impressed but desperately looks for Ethan who is not there in any of the three groups. He then sees his grandson running around a table with a wand in hand and some other kids following him. Mr. Weissman asks the principal what is the aptitude of the children in that far table, and she smilingly says, "That’s the happiness group. They do not have any special aptitude but are the happiest lot in the school.” The grandfather is taken aback and asks, "There must have been some mistake in your examination and the results. My grandson is a first born Weissman and each of these people have a long tradition of greatness and fame in academics. Please do the test again!" The test is conducted once again and Ethan does even worse than before and is now consigned to be a permanent and leading member of the Happy Group.

 

Weissman is distraught and returns home where he blames his daughter and son-in-law that they have ruined the family name. He even shows them a hard bound book of the achievements of the first born children in the Weissman family over generations. “They play Mozart by the time they are six!” The daughter, Mrs. Maisel, is unperturbed and says, “Papa, let Ethan be happy.” 

 

“You want Ethan to be happy? Do you know that no great man in the world in any area of excellence has ever been happy? Look at all the scientists, musicians, authors and academicians… none of them had a happy life. They sacrificed happiness for the sake of greatness.”

 

This one line got me thinking. Is happiness an antithesis to greatness? Mr. Weissman’s declaration seemed to be true. Each of the luminaries I could think of, had a miserable and tragic personal life. More important question for me was, why can we not let children experience the world and choose for themselves an area of their aptitude? Do we, as parents, influence their judgements and impose our aspirations and disappointments and expect our children to do things we were not able to achieve? Why can’t we just let children choose happiness? Why should everyone be made to follow a set pattern of thinking and have a pre-decided career path even before you understand any of the subjects? 

I remembered my childhood. I loved to play and nothing gave me more happiness than being outside on the playfield playing outdoor sports. Books and science in particular were things I detested. Yet when I had to fill in a form in class ten on two options for higher secondary, my father insisted that I apply for Section A which was basically for those students interested in pursuing medicine after school. My father, like all Bongs, for whom becoming a doctor was the only noble profession to pursue wanted me to choose that. His expectations were not matched by the school records of his son who was found completely unfit for science and math. He was given Section E which was a mixture of humanities and commerce. Actually, this was the happiness class… except for a few students, these were the laggards in studies but excelled in sports and extra-curricular. My father must have been disappointed but then he saw that his son liked football and history as a subject. He was the man who would take me to Ambedkar Stadium to see the Durand and DCM Cup Tournaments, and he even came to see me play at times. Having lost the first choice of subject for his son, he accepted the school’s better judgement and now wished that his son got through the civil services examinations. I disappointed him on this count as well for not getting through the ranks despite reaching the interview stage on two occasions.

College for me was the era of happiness…. Masti- Kaal, in today’s lingo, where I would go to college every day without fail but not attend classes…. It was spent happily on the playground and college canteen. To just give you an idea of how good these days were, in the final year at college I did not attend a single of class and yet my name did not appear in the list of students whose attendance was below the minimum requirement. Since my name never figured on the registers of lecturers, how on earth could anyone record my attendance and declare that it was short! In the post-graduation, I appeared in sixteen separate subject examinations after attending four and two days in MA Previous and Final respectively. That’s the glorious Delhi University where many like me have got their degrees without attending lectures. Masti-kaal indeed!

 

Is happiness the state of mind we all wished for? You may say happiness is something you get after long years of struggle and pain. Tell me, honestly, if you had an option would you not want happiness always? We justify our struggles by saying that good karma and hard work will bring you happiness. What if it was given to you without any of these painful experience? Happiness is something we all aspire for whether in this earth or another otherwise how else can you explain these small WA forwards some of which I have preserved over the years and used in this blog … each of them with a common theme.

A majority of us keep working and keep at it to achieve greater heights and glory in our respective fields. But then there are people who experience life differently. Recently, during a business tete-a-tete, I met a man who would be around forty. He is hugely successful and is the head of finance department of a large corporate. He said, “For five days in a week, I slog like a dog. My day can stretch beyond midnight at times and I give everything that I have to my work. Come Saturday and Sunday, I switch off and you can’t connect with me. I go out of the maddening city to experience nature and wild life in particular.” He said he does camping and just gaze at the sky above and stars for hours. His brush with wildlife began years ago when he went on a safari where he saw a tiger at close proximity. “The eye contact with the tiger was the tipping point and since then I keep travelling to various parks to see wildlife and tigers in particular.” I sat listening to this young man with rapt attention and felt how much of life had I given up in my so called pursuit of happiness. He also gave me an option of what to do in the coming days when running to and from office and frantic work related tours from one corner of the country to another will no longer be my routine. 

Happiness is calling…where are you? 

SS