SJ and JS : Thanks for shaping my thoughts!! RIP

This is my first weekend in Mumbai after I started my internship in Citibank.

Pune, to me is a lot of good food, cozy home , lovely wife and sweet long drives. I missed it this time majorly for the sake of a deteriorated health which warranted travel. I didn’t just miss Pune this time but consciously avoided any other busy-ness.

It’s been long since I had a word with myself. The weather outside , the soothing sound of the rain , the lovely  breeze caressing my disheveled hair locks , the quietness of the floor and no pressing work calls for a perfect date with myself.

Well , I can talk about a lot of things , my work  - which I officially hate , my weight loss programme – which is yet to start , the future aspirations – that I am still confused about  or  the state of the MBA and engineering jobs being offered – a wholesale mandi these days.

However, I think I shall talk to myself about 2 important people in my life and about my favorite topic – my dreams.

Recently, there was sad demise of two important persons who had deeply touched my life and coincidentally their initials share the same letters: SJ and JS , i.e Steve Jobs and Jagjit Singh.The reasons though very different, their work in life has formed the pillars of my being and action.

I first got to know JS at the age of 14 , when most of the kids were lost in the cricketing fancies of Sachin. Thanks to the pathetic electricity at my hometown , I was bereft of many of those marvelous innings. However , the walkman that I had was an excellent company along with the then 60 Rs cassette of Sony Crescendo – Marasim.

I was a very thoughtful kid who had always wanted to understand and explore human emotions and JS voice and the lyrics of his ghazals were something I could relate to. My personal life was a collection of many subtle experiences, of which I had used to ponder endlessly.

With every  passing year, the  correlation between my life and the ghazals of JS became closer to the perfect  one.  Infact my first proposal to a girl in Class XIth was a result of one of the Ghazals “ yun mere khat ka jawab aaya”. Although not of JS, one can easily see the influence of Ghazals in my day to day life.

I was never a good student. However, the recipe to study which helped me work it out just fine for my IIT entrance examination was a closed room , with an airy window , a table lamp , black in colour , neatly arranged table  on which in one corner was the Philips tape recorder with JS’ s voice soothing my nerves. It was hours for which I could solve the numerical while listening to his masterpieces.

Thanks to You! The recipe worked and I could clear IITJEE.

Even then the tryst with JS continued while my life resembled a roller coaster. While it was sometimes about love , sometimes sadness , sometimes it was just for the peace of my mind. Yeah , somehow they had found me a way to be at peace.

SJ , too has affected my mind considerably and probably for the rest of my life. SJ for me is an epitome of imagination turned into reality. He is one of those original thinkers who can envision future. The  meaning of the word exciting for me is close to the bitten apple and his thoughts on how to connect the dots or how to stay hungry and foolish.

While at Infosys Services, I was selected as a research scientist in ISRO which I denied to work for Infosys R&D with the inspiration of creating something for the future, very much inspired by the Roark of my real life , SJ.

I kept following Apple closely and the protagonist SJ and his speech in Stanford about living each day was for a long time very close to my heart.

Today I am someone who wants to work on the products/services of the future, help create those, popularize them and make them reach the masses. I am an engineer from the heart , MBA from the mind and a philosopher from the soul, and I thank you both for leading me become what I am today.

Although I always thought there will be a day I could meet you, I think it shall have to wait till I give back to the world from the mind , heart and soul just as you both did !!! RIP...