A SWOT Analysis

Ever heard of eating chocolate and sobbing at the same time?

I thought that could only happen in movies when the female protagonist tries to get over heart-break; now I know it can happen for real. I have experienced what I believed to be impossible my entire life: chocolate can fail to secrete endorphins in the brain.

From past weekend, I have been living alone for the first time in my life. My husband has gone to India for work. When we used to have serious fights; I would warn him to mellow him down that I would go away for some days. I did not mean it thinking he would never have the courage to let me go away from him. I guess my husband turned out to be braver than I estimated (should I be proud?) Going forward, I would need to devise a new caution to threaten him in those dire circumstances.

Not having any option, I decided to look at the brighter side of the situation: I could eat as much butter as I pleased and nobody could force me to exercise.

On day one, I realized that after having slept for ten hours, hogged risotto three times, and read more than I did in a year; some gap still waited to be filled. To all the people in the world who fret over time management, my advice to them is vivre seul. I have come to know how much work my husband is.

I guess I am more scared than bored. In the eerie silence at dark, otherwise normal footsteps seem overbearing and remind me of murder mystery novels. I think the knock on any door is on mine when I didn’t expect any visitors. I wonder why I never heard those noises when my husband was around. Is sense of security in the mind? My married friends who relate to this edge-of-the-seat-thrill console me saying, “You’ll get used to it.” I don’t see that happening. Why doesn’t my husband know that I am not and can never be that self-sufficient material?

I do not intend this to be a weepy baby post. So I must say living alone is doing some good to me. I have become more social, patient yet productive, independent, versatile and introspective. Here’s how:

I Facebook and email random people I had not thought about in months, just to get comments, to see a pretty number in my inbox, to fool myself that I’m not alone.

When you have the same amount of work as before but feel like you have 42 hours to fill, expansion seems like an obvious strategy. I read slowly to absorb rather than to complete the book. I chew and swallow food in my mouth before taking the next bite. I close my eyes to pray. The effect: never-known-before peace to my hyperactive mind. I compensate the pace by doing one task after another. The tortoise and the hare story, remember? By considering getting up and falling to sleep as two ends of a continuum, I tacitly try to prohibit emotions to seep in.

I finally reached a point yesterday when I could not avoid doing laundry- a chore for which my husband demands enormous credit. I did it last evening and realized I did not have to depend on him for clean clothes at least. For banking and technical support? May be.

I was procrastinating from last two years to play my guitar fearing I may have forgotten the chords I learned. Finally, my guitar is glad to be out and I am startled to find how many notes I remember.

Knowing there is nobody to force me to do the right things so I could cheat, the much-sought-by-all inner voice in me has got accentuated. I listen to myself in the serenity- interacting, coercing, motivating and pampering my own self. And for the record, I exercised for 45 record-breaking minutes.

I deserve a chocolate. Or maybe I should eat healthier yoghurt instead.