The Art Of Saying Goodbye

As a school girl, I would always wave a good bye to my mother; whenever I left home. The regularity turned to habit and the habit into compulsion; so much that I would insist on my mother standing near the garden gate when I was leaving for school, tuition classes, going out with friends etc. "Ta-ta !" is how I waved my hand for a good bye. I somehow connected it all to good luck, something that would make my day great and wonderful.

After I got married, me and my husband shifted to a different city. I would keep in regular touch with my parents through the telephone and now the mobile. But given any call, our conversation ends with  a "Ta-ta". It has now been more than eighteen years since my marriage, but even to this day, whenever I am visiting my parents, I still make it a point to follow my compulsion of waving a good bye to my mother. And the best thing is me continuing this habit with our daughter. As a result of which whenever she is to leave home, she expects me to come to the door and give her best wishes along with a good bye.

These two emotionally bonding and psychologically assuring situations in my life prompted me to delve further on goodbyes and farewells and accordingly I have put my thoughts on this blog organizing my discussion for different situations.

1. Person to person goodbye
An informal goodbye involves differences depending on the age, environment and mood ! Remember the days when your school friend would come visiting or vice versa and the longest conversations would take place after deciding to bid a goodbye ?! The most serious of discussion takes place when in your forties you meet one such friend and after the initial effervescent updates, you both end up reminiscing memories and enjoying the unspoken thoughts. Such a rendezvous does not necessarily involve a goodbye, but only the promise to meet again. For the senior citizens, the chance meeting is all about racking the memory and amazing at the divine intervention of bringing lost friends together and saying a quick goodbye; in case the memory permits.

2. Professional Goodbye
With a busy working schedule and hectic lifestyle, your office colleagues become a part of life. Little joys of sharing success or failure over a cup of tea, discussions involving projects over heated discussions, getting involved in social activities as a division, etc; all ensure good camaraderie and connectivity to make the professional environment a thing to look forward to. Goodbyes in such situations truly mean to meet each other the next working day for colleagues or next official meeting for the clients. The goodbyes are more to do with an eagerness to meet again in order to keep oneself updated and informed of all the professional interests or developments.  

3. Group Goodbye
The school reunions, alumni meets, professional groups, virtual groups, family groups, friends groups, hobby groups, parents groups; all are a part and parcel of our life. The 'get together' has been promptly replaced with 'chat together' by making communication easy and fast. Such groups have lots of messages on initial greetings but very few on goodbyes. In case all group members decide to meet for good old times sake, then the good byes are laden with lot of hope to keep in touch. At such times, real conversation

4. Retirement and Goodbye
This is a very difficult moment for any person who has been completely devoted to his career / job / company. Most of the times, it is difficult to 'un-follow' the office routine. Great effort has to be put in during the retirement phase with conscious detachment from people and delegation of duty. Subordinates who once followed professional protocol, become pals later on. Superiors who commanded and demanded respect opt for developing a camaraderie. In both cases, one has to pursue interests for keeping busy. Hence, the good bye to the company or career, becomes more of introspection for developing other interests and practicing them.

5. Worldly Goodbye
The Hindus believe in four age-based life stages as discussed in Indian texts of the ancient and medieval eras. These stages are Brahmacharya (student), Grihastha (householder), Vanaprastha (retired) and Sanyasa (renunciation). Accordingly, a person is expected to shoulder responsibility or delegate responsibility or renounce the world and its pleasures as per the stage. This is the most difficult of all goodbyes; if at all one is aware of the last farewell. At such a time, thoughts wander to leaving the loved ones with a clear conscience and in the hope of attaining peace.

Easier said than done. It is not easy to say a last goodbye to oneself, to others or to a loved one. Peace lies in the fact that there was emotional and spiritual bond that was shared and which cannot be shredded just by bidding a farewell.

Electric Scooter

My daughter as a teenager, is a world in herself. A world that drives itself and a world that drives others ! Our entire family revolves as per her schedule. If its her vacation, we are relaxed; if its her busy day, we are kept busy. No wonder then that as soon as she mentioned about driving a two wheeler to her tuition class, friends, college; we grabbed our chance at our independence. The arrival of an eco-friendly electric scooter interested us. Even the rules for the low speed electric scooter are friendly for students under eighteen years of age.

The three of us, father, mother and daughter; went to the company shop and all of us took turns in riding the most popular vehicle. We were told of two prospective electric scooters that would be suitable. Mother daughter liked the 'Optima' model which was costly by Rs 8000/- compared to the other one. Father, on the other hand, had his own calculations and did not want to pay the additional amount for his daughter's fancies. At the same time, another set of parents had come with their daughter's electric scooter for its first service.

As with most women and especially mothers, the two of us got talking about the performance of the vehicle. Casually I mentioned that we were interested in buying the 'Optima' scooter but would settle for the cheaper one. "Oh no ! That scooter has some design flaw. We had also purchased the same model, but it is not good for the back, hence we purchased the 'Optima' model.", said the lady.

"Arey, listen to the lady's opinion", I called out to my husband. Immediately, my husband and daughter gathered. My daughter's ears were already pointed towards her mother, for she saw a ray of hope in getting her scooter model of preference. The lady briefed the three of us again and switched to the benefits of scooter model of our choice. Her enthusiasm, exuberance and electric personality; scooted away any doubts from our mind.

The next few minutes saw us complete the paperwork and in a week the scooter was delivered to our home. My daughter's bright smile befits her electric scooter; all because of 'The woman' who helped us make a decision.

Why Breaking News?

The News Channels, these days have metamorphosed into everything except news narration. They invite speakers who are prodded to get into futile arguments, improper accusations, irrelevant discussions etc. The news narration is exceptionally dramatic for increasing the TRPs and viewership. The diversification of types of news channel based on language and state has further provided so many versions of the actual truth. Even the usual soaps have started to drown in their own froth (read masala). No wonder, everybody these days have now started to focus on outdoor activities or fun filled indoor games. 

It is exactly this desire of doing activities that bring happiness and contentment to oneself, communication and bonding with others; which point to the fact that humans would rather be in a happy normal situation rather than a dramatized one. 

I am sure the social networking shares and youtube videos that are most watched are the ones that inspire you or make you happy. Who would like to watch videos depicting cruelty, bloodshed, killings, etc ? Even the existing ghastly videos come with a blurred spot or a statutory warning.

So then why do the news channel not follow suit ? Why do they make us watch 'Breaking News' instead of 'Binding News - News that Bind people' or 'Happy News - News that cheers'? Human brain tends to remember the good memories of ones life and that itself is enough to keep it on track for betterment and contentment, in general. I am sure that if people get to watch the good deeds and acts of others, they will tend to try out the same; instead of focusing on the bad deeds. It is as simple as saying 'Do this' instead of saying 'Don't Do This'.

Lets try to keep one channel dedicated to the concept of display of good deeds by citizens and then let us observe the difference that it makes.