Manish Barua

Abstract

2  

Manish Barua

Abstract

Day 2 - Abnormally Normal

Day 2 - Abnormally Normal

4 mins
274


Dear Diary,


Another day goes by. To be honest, I wasn’t really looking forward to the day. I pretty much knew that it is going to be spent behind the four walls like a prisoner. Maybe not as bad as a prisoner. They are not fortunate to get a delicious meal and a kind of view my balcony offers. That’s what happens with empty minds. It becomes nonsensical and contemplates whatever it can. That is why I don’t let it remain unoccupied for a long time.


As soon as I woke up, I checked my phone. I know the most prohibited thing to do. But I do have something to say that justifies this move. As known the entire schedule has gone for a toss. There is literally no head and tail. I mean look around, there is no urgency at all. No urgency to get up early – go to school or office or to your own shop. Everything around is shut and so is the business and organization. Where will you go? Nowhere. So, why not sleep well and wake up late. And I did both.


Hence, it was imperative for me to check my emails and messages, if any, from my boss. Since the work is going on minus the travel time or the desk I would use at the office. Not in full swing as it would normally do. Considering the end of the quarter. But enough to occupy my major portion of the day.


The second thing that I did was to Google. I didn’t even need to type completely. It picks up the most typed phrases or words. So, I typed “Corona” and it populated “Coronavirus in India”. It has become like another ritual for me to check the numbers. Undoubtedly, it is growing many folds. Then I left it there then. I thought we as citizens should comply with this lockdown and curb the spread. Hopefully, the numbers will go down.


For the rest of the day, I remained busy. It was quite unnatural to be occupied in calls and meetings. But that’s a good thing. It really helps and gives you that satisfaction that it was worth it. Though the present situation was abnormal, some normalcy is definitely desirable.


The faded sound of two-wheeler and private cars were the major distractions. Unlike their incessant honks and throttling noise that fills the normal day. Though I didn’t expect them to be on the road. It looked fairly busy then it appeared yesterday. Seems the sanitized sticks were out of action today (Just kidding). I just hope that the travelers or the risk bearers hadn’t crowded the place and strictly exercised social distancing.


After I was done with my work. I participated in playing a stupid game with my son. Sighting nothing fruitful for that moment, we invented the craziest version of house cricket where the bowler would bowl from the distance of 4-5 feet in a sitting position and the batsman while lying in the sleeping position. The objective of the batsman to hit the bowl on the full at different directions, making it difficult for the bowler to catch. As strange as it may sound, we had a ball. I never even could imagine in my dreams that a simple and stupid way of playing this game would give us so much pleasure and fun. My wife too laughed watching us play.


Then after dinner, we thought of Netflixing but decided against it and rolled dices at the monopoly board. The same thing we did yesterday. We weren’t playing on the actual but the virtual one on my mobile phone. To add flavor and make the game more interesting we included one robot as well apart from us participating in it. We stopped once my son declared bankruptcy. His appearance suggested that tears would roll out at any moment. I was afraid of that. Of course, I don't like to see him cry, not for such petty reasons. Just as we thought that he would cry as he normally does while playing other games. Whenever he loses. But he didn't and seemed to take it boldly, guess he remembered my lecture where I told him that one shouldn’t cry on losing but should try hard to win the next time.


Finally, I called it a day by publishing this small and casual story for the challenge. Though the first one isn’t out yet. It is being evaluated by the story mirror team. Hopefully, the first one will be out by the team you get to read this one. Hence, I pushed this one out in the queue.


Stay Home - Stay Safe!


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