A step towards a better me...

I don't usually make New Year Resolutions. For one, I believe that if I indeed have resolved that I have to do something, I should start immediately and not wait until the new year. Secondly, usually my New Year Resolutions don't even last through January.

But now it has so happened that I have a new resolution - and since it is almost New Year, I have decided to call it my New Year Resolution. One that I am going to make sure doesn't fizzle out.

I have decided to be more systematic, organized and disciplined.

No, please, I am not that hopelessly untidy or disorganized. But there is a lot of scope for improvement. The problem is that I have never felt the need to be that organized, until now.

And to think the people around me are so magnificently orderly. My grandmother. Her Godrej steel almirah. It is such a pleasure to behold it. Her silk sarees neatly folded and placed in hangers - all of them folded to the same dimensions, no protruding ends anywhere. Her cotton sarees folded crisply, placed one above the other, in perfect towers. No Leaning Towers of Pisa here. Her almirah is a study in perfection. She even adds to the effect by placing a bit of sandalwood shaving, or some other sweet-smelling thing in the corners, and when you open the almirah, you get a whiff of the fragrance – such a treat to the senses. Ok, my almirah need not be that faultless. But at least I could have inherited a fraction of that attention to detail? At least as much as to prevent clothes from falling out when the almirah is opened?

Then my mother. She keeps her home and her kitchen spotlessly clean. The furniture is perfectly placed, pots and plants and flowers and curios positioned in strategic places, the bed beautifully made, the cupboards neat and clean, everything in their proper places. When she cooks, there is no trace of it even when she is in the midst of the cooking. She is that meticulous. As for me, you can see vegetable peels and flour everywhere, until I finish and clean up.

My father. Every document, every passbook, cheque book, every bill in place. In neatly arranged folders, in well-maintained and dated files and books. And it is not that he spends unnecessary hours on it. It is just that he is prompt, and precise. If you ask him for a certain something, he will get it for you in a minute. As for me, the less said the better. Check out this conversation, you will get an idea.

Me(calling him up): Papa, is my IOB chequebook with you?
Papa: Let me check. (Half a minute later), No, it must be with you.
Me: Ok, I will check. (There is no question whatsoever of wondering if my father might be wrong, and maybe he has misplaced it).
(After two hours).
Papa: Did you find it?
Me: No I don't think I have it.
Papa: Check again.
(Two days later)
Papa: Did you find it?
Me: No, I looked everywhere, its not there.
Papa: Check again.
(A week later).
Me: Err... ummm... Papa, I found it.
Papa: Where was it?
Me: With my medical bills.

I haven't inherited these qualities from anybody. I could have got at least a bit of it. But no. I have to rely entirely on my own interest and effort to be as systematic as these people mentioned above.

Or I could have picked it up from association. My mom-in-law runs a well-oiled home. All things in their right places all the time, everything done just so. S is also very organized. He knows where his things are, and he keeps records, and maintains files for documents. He is tidy, and dislikes clutter. He thinks he has room for improvement, and while that might be true, it is also true that compared to me, he is a whole world apart. He is distressed by how unorganized I am. He has been trying to bring some improvement in me ever since we got married - but how can he, alone, succeed in such a short time, where my parents, combined, could not for a quarter of a century?

So, I conclude, it has to come from me. From within me. Not for the first time have I realized the need to be organized. But I have comprehended the fact that it has now turned into a necessity.

So, by putting this on my blog, where the whole world (and more importantly, my parents and S) can read it, I am throwing my hat across the fence, so to say. And so, I enter the new year with hope.

A very happy, healthy and peaceful new year to all of you!