What’s The Right Word, Again?

What’s The Right Word Again?

So a couple of days ago I got this weird phone call in the middle of a busy work evening….

Person (Sexy,female voice): Hello

Me : Oh, helloooo.

Person : This is Miss.So-and-so…and I am reporter with So-And-So newspaper.

Me (wary immediately and wondering what they have on me and who squealed): Yes?

Person : We are doing a feature for our supplement on blogging in Chennai. I know you are a member of the oldest, largest, best, most widely read and very popular blogging community of India who were the first ones to introduce blogging to ignorant Indians and taught them how to write from A, B, C, D etc and popularized their blogs and trained everyone to go potty etc…..and do you want to add a few words on the greatness of this blogging group, care to?

Me (irritated beyond measure): are you sure you dialed the right person?

Person : this is ganesh right?

Me (in a- you asked for it baby mood): yeah this is DOCTOR GANESH……

If you are Former Patient – Say “1”, 

If you are current patient – Say “2” 

And if you are a future patient – Say “Cheese”….

Now which one of my buttons would you like to press?

Person : Total silence….

Call Cut…

And that’s how I deal with pesky callers who impersonate reporters but act as publicists for random blogging groups. And for the record – no bloody blogging community taught me how to blog- I did it all on my own. And I would never go around ass-kissing anyone to get mentioned in the morning papers…I would rather get on with my life- my blogging is time pass and not an official endorsement for anyone

Proving a Damn Point.

Proving a Damn Point.

A friend was talking to me yesterday when he started complaining about the teasing he was suffering at the workplace from the management and how his entire job experience had turned bitter. When I asked him as to why he was still hanging around that damn job, for after all he was well qualified, experienced and bright and would be snatched up by any other competitor, the answer he gave me was this "because I don’t want them to win, I want to prove my point by sticking on there till they kick me out themselves". Excuse me, you would rather wait to be kicked out then walk out with dignity? Surprising. Anyway to come back to this “proving a point” thing- I keep hearing this justification very often from plenty of others too and each time I wonder about it, whether it is a wisest course of action.

The point is, I don’t get the point of proving a point (forgive the bad alliteration, coudnt resist). In my point of view any place, act, or situation which makes you uncomfortable and irritates you is a flashing red sign to get away from that stressful place (or person). If going to work every day means you are at a high state of tension throughout the day and the stress is going to give you High Blood Pressure, Kidney failure, maybe a Stroke or two and an Heart-Attack to boot, then I couldn’t care less about proving a point to some moron if it’s going to hurt me that much ultimately. No anger or grudge is worth destroying our own health and peace of mind. When I stated this belief of mine to another colleague seated nearby, he said that he sympathized with the other guy and if I didn’t agree with the majority view, then I must be a cold blooded type.

I am not sure what he meant by being hot-blooded but if it means flying into a temper at the drop of a hat, boiling with rage, swearing vengeance, carrying grudges or fighting a vendetta to prove my point- then please count me out. I am not interested in remembering every hurt or betrayal and living just to take revenge for it. That is just not me- I am slow to anger, fast to cool down and I forgive easily. Life, to me, is too short and precious to waste it on grudges. I would rather forget and move on with doing my own thing. And I sure as hell don’t want to prove a point to anyone on anything if it means loss of peace of mind to me. In my often stated view- life should be calm, peaceful and stress-less as we glide over its smoothly polished surface.

To intentionally create havoc in our own lives just to teach someone else a lesson is utter foolishness in my view. Karma will get them in due course so why waste all our energies and precious moments of the present planning a possible gloating moment of the future? Maybe I will never get it- why people are ready to go so far to get revenge. Maybe I really am a cold fish. Or maybe, just maybe, I am wiser than all those grudge-holders, revenge-seekers and point-provers. Who knows? Have you any idea?

Much Ado over a Selfie....

Much Ado over a Selfie....

Have you ever been called ugly to your face or to rephrase it, your face has been called ugly to you? Well, I was - last night in a Facebook chat. Now before you start dialing my mobile to demand that I provide you with the name and address of the one who called me so- let me add that the conversation was with someone who is just an online acquaintance and i haven't had much interaction with in the real world. So rest easy and leave at home those hockey sticks and cricket bats you were intending to bring to my defense, but hey, thanks for the support.

Anyway to start from the beginning the conversation was kicked off by a recent change of my profile picture on Facebook- a picture shot by one of my photographer friends showing my face at close up- in black and white. It had been a few months since i had changed my profile picture and so I though it would make a nice change to show my current face as on date as my profile picture. What I hadn't bargained for was such a response to that innocuous change.

In a few minutes I got a chat message from a Facebook friend about the picture change and the chat message went on to ask "how do you bravely put up such a close up picture of your face?” Now this was a loaded question which could at a superficial reading be taken as a compliment to my courage but on a deeper analysis the question is "how dare you show your ugly mug to us at close-up range". I immediately replied that "all things considered the answer is because it is my face and it is my profile and if I don’t put up my own picture on my profile whose should I put up?" which was an unsubtle dig at the person who asked the question who hides behind a generic ClipArt avatar as profile picture.

Later on, actually this morning over a cup of tea at the canteen, I thought back on the whole thing and came to the conclusion that I was an idiot to even answer that question. The person who asked me the question is obviously not normal but must have mega psychological issues if they prefer to hide their identities behind either celebrity photos or other nature scenes like flowers, fans and even cameras. A real person (as opposed to someone who has a fake online ID) has no reason whatsoever to hide their face behind anything or anyone else's as long as they aren’t a criminal and have their mugs on a most wanted poster.

And the obvious reason that such people use these generic nature pictures are that they are sick- they are not confident of themselves and they hate their own faces. They think that more people would prefer to deal with them if only they look like actresses Trisha or Samantha or actors like Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. And I can’t help but wonder how much they hate themselves and their own faces if they won’t even show it out in public. These are damaged persons and to respond rationally to them and expect them to understand is usually a waste of time, but what the hell, let me at least try.

My friend - my face in close up or long shot is mine own. I was born with it, i live with it and I prefer to show it as it is - in both real life and the online world. I agree with you when you say that I am not handsome, pretty beautiful or anything of that sort- I am just about average and normal. But being normal is nothing to sneeze at. You just don’t know how lucky a person is to be born normal and average in the great genetic lottery of birth.

In my profession as a cosmetic surgeon everyday I get to see patients whose most ardent wish is to look normal without any facial deformities (like cleft lips) or disproportional growth of the face-lopsided face. As such i am very happy with my normal, ordinary face and wouldn't do anything to change it. If by your logic only beautiful people should take close-up photographs of their faces then 5 billion or so people can never take a Selfie - for the odds are heavily in favor of the ordinary over the pretty.

And so I am happy and proud to go around town showing my perfectly ordinary face and society's arbitrary standards of beauty be damned. And finally the definition of manliness doesn’t require a pretty face, being a man, a real man requires something else and I realize that you just don’t get it....

And if you still aren’t convinced, take this, in your face...

the controversial selfie of the post