The Final Exam

 

Yama- The Lord of Death

I wonder why I find myself staring at a blank wall so often. But then what else does one do when there is so much to ponder and so little is explained.  I think of how my life has gone so far, from the cradle to the crooked road. I wonder where that road leads to hereafter and if I want to go there, now that I have got here. As I wade through the undulating rush of unanswered questions, I say to myself; "Perhaps, in the end all the wall-staring will boil down to just one question- Have I lived a life worth living?"

As fatalistic as it may sound is it not a question whose answer one owes to oneself in the end? Every course has an examination, every task an evaluation, every job an appraisal, every action a consequence. So why must life itself be left without an answer? Since I have already made a hackneyed comparison between life and examination, I will hope and pray that like all examinations I don't start looking for life's answers on the penultimate day, and find myself half prepared to barely pass the test. In life unlike in exams, I have been told there is no "back papers". I will feel very sorry for myself if while taking my last breath I am still fumbling around for answers to whether my life was worth living and pass away without being able to complete my sentence. You know, like Luca Brasi in that movie; Or, like remembering an equation just when the final bell has rung and the examiner bellows to put down the pen. One can also call it the perfect Mr Bean moment, I suppose.

So, I have vowed to learn from my mistakes and prepare a complete dossier starting today! Yes today; Like someone I knew from my Engineering days who would start studying courses for the next semester from the day the exams for the current semester concluded. My reverence (Shraddha.. that may well be his name) to the blessed being. I have therefore decided to list all the good things that I have learnt so far. One must not be shy about these things. That one up there may be a salesman for all you know. He buys good souls and culls out the rotten ones. I have been informed through books, movies and  several authentic documentaries that he looks exactly like that bearded man on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel. But wait! What if after all the preparation and memorizing I get a visit from Mr Alzheimer even before I get visited by Mr The End. I mean it is not so uncommon after all. The former is known to be the faster of the two gentlemen. Besides I have never come across a human being who first got visited by the latter and then by the former. My grandfather got visited by Mr Al  a few days before Mr End came to see him. I wasn't there by his side but I hear that after a short chat with Mr Al my grandpa went on a verbal shooting spree abusing every human being who happened to cross his road. Now I don't know about the pain he went through, but what would I not give to have that license, to yell and scream at the people I dislike for the things they do and the things they don't. I call it the license to tell the truth. But anyway, Mr End visited him soon to save the onlookers from the agony of having to hear the truth from the mouth of a crazy man. My grandpa and he are friends now. Together they snipe at which one of those earthlings to take out next. Anyway, let us not digress from the moot point.

Next on my list should be the good that I have done for myself (for there is very little that I have done for anyone else). Now look; I was given this gift of life. I did not ask for it. Ever since I was made responsible I have taken good care of it. I have dressed well, eaten well, enjoyed well. In fact I have selfishly done quite well. Should that not be considered an achievement? Of course it should! So next I will pen down all the delicacies I have eaten so far. Oh how I wish there was an iphone when I was devouring those Rs15 ghee-roasted chicken legs while in college and the Rs2.50 aloo-kabli while at school. I could have made a collage  in the form of a giant shield and placed it by my bedside. So when Mr End and I meet I can present him with a dossier of my culinary faculties. Who knows, he may give me the much coveted  Best-Life-Lived award in the Well Eaten category! But I have known people who were better than me in this field and had half the components from their digestive system removed before Mr End showed up. What if I have to be taken in a wheelchair to the podium with a food pipe poked up my nasal path to receive this award! Will I remember the taste of all the good food I have eaten in life while I say my Thank You speech to the bored listeners? Oh lets be cheerful! Life will never play such a dirty trick on me. Why would it ? I have selfishly devoted all my efforts toward it and to nothing else in this world, and life knows it.

Let me not be so somber. I am a well-educated self sufficient working man after all. Though I cannot be boastful of my earnings I can definitely stick my neck above the crowd of smelly countrymen. I dream of having a house like every working man. I wish to live in it, but above all I want to stand in front of it and have a photograph clicked as a token of my accomplishment in life. Hey that is a good idea! One more thumb up for the dossier I am preparing. A house. A consummate accomplishment in the era I live! I am going to look around that empty room and smell the wonderful paint and feel the gentle breeze from a uber-technical air-conditioner while I make a modern exit. What a grand exit that will be, like Hamlet. But what if I get visited by Mr Com(m)a before Mr End (a.k.a Mr Full Stop) and get robbed of the opportunity to evaluate my life's worth in terms of the bricks, cement, ceramic tiles and paints? What then?

Well at least I have read a few books you know and I can write fairly well. So I will prepare a good final speech (So what if I cannot sing "My Way" like Presley or Sinatra to announce my departure to the world). But then I think of my aunt's dad who was a venerable doctor with a head full of knowledge and a wonderful heart (not biologically though). He had half a face paralyzed in his later years and could only mumble a few incoherent syllables which made stifling a laughter extremely difficult for me. That's perhaps why most of Shakespeare's tragic heroes delivered there famous soliloquies while there was time. Few waited till the very end.  By now my head hurts and there is a bitter taste in my mouth. I wonder if I will ever be prepared for this exam with so many floating parameters. This is like that night before the Maths exam where multiple allegedly leaked question papers were floating around the hostel. I remember how that story ended (http://saptarshimoitra.blogspot.com/2012/05/most-colourful-time-in-hostel-is.html). I just hope it will not be the same with life.

I am closing the dossier for now. I will let dust accumulate on it for a while. Maybe I will forget where I kept it. Time is a great healer I am told.