career crisis

i think i'l start a new phase in my life. the current one is getting jaded.

i have decided i'l be an agony aunt. not that i am not one already, but i have decided to go professional.

three life-altering years as an elementary teacher has taught me all i need to know about human nature. plus, quick thinking, decision making, personality analysis by just looking at the twitching of a nose or the flicker of an eyelid, pronouncing the final word and succintly summing up a situation are all now second nature. i am perfect agony aunt material.

i dont see how any self-respecting newspaper or magazine can get a better deal. on top of all my other qualifications for the job, i have one more. i can supply the question as well ! two for the price of one.

Q.

dear agony aunt,

i suspect my husband is having an affair. he comes back from work very late, and smiles at me! he also has the smell of another woman all over him. what should i do? should i just confront him that i am wise to his villany?

mrs. suspicious

A.

dear mrs. suspicious,

how can you be so certain that there is another woman involved? if it makes you feel any better (then again, it might not), it could be someone of an entirely different persuasion. anyway, why not look at the silver lining? atleast now he smells good when he comes back home.

Wisdom, and the places to find it.

time was when i used to think wisdom lay at the threshold of turning twenty and entering the magical world of adulthood. all gawkiness, social misery and lack fo witty repartee would be things of the past. blushes would never again drown me in red pools of mortification, nor would the foot-in-mouth syndrome strike with such alarming regularity.

well, it seems i was -yet again- wrong.

i have found this most underrated quality of the human race in the most unexpected of places. in the sharply observed one-liners from my mother which condense a character to its essence; the startling see-all gaze of a child which cuts throught layers of feigned interest; the quiet understanding of old friends when they let one rant a self-righteous soliloquy; the solid common sense of old people; sometimes in the most unlikeliest of them all - in myself.

still, for someone who lives in words, wisdom is a rare commodity nowadays. all is dash and flourish and clever sentences. intelligent perhaps, but not wise.

one writer who is a contrary delight is Alexander Mc.Call Smith. the gentle humour - not ascerbic but sympathetic, the keen observing eye, the deft characterisation and the feel of leisure his writing brings, i have yet to find it all in another's writing, except perhaps, that of J0anne Harris. even now, i am struck by the -that word again- wisdom of his lines.

perhaps there was no real point to our existence -or none that we could discern- and that meant that the real question that had to be asked was this: how can i make my life more bearable? we are here whether we like it or not, and by and large we seem to have a need to continue. in that case, the real question to be addressed is: how are we going to make the experience of being here as fulfilling, as good as possible?

or,

we all fall in love, and some of us are sentenced to unrequited love, talking about it over cups of coffee in flats like this, with friends just like this, and oddly comforted by the process.

How to acquire fans and impress people

.....provided they are armpit(or below)-height people.

anyway;

Ingredients:

Item Description Quantity

child small a few

window foggy one, to begin with

finger preferably your own one, for starters

Process:

Make sure intended audience is not (a) sleepy, (b) fighting with its neighbour, (c) busy sticking its head/hand out of the window, (d) reading a book - it happens sometimes, (e) picking its nose - it happens often.

Do something to grab attention - simple things like vomiting, bumping one's head against the seat-back opposite one, or putting up both hands over one's head and wiggling one's fingers work generally.

Once attention is grabbed, work fast. juvenile attention dissipates faster than the fizz out of a cola bottle.

Draw a figure on the foggy glass with your finger. Try a fish for starters (If you cannot do even that, go and die immediately)

Wait for someone to notice "fish" in a bored voice, and then proceed. Draw a larger fish, with a more sinister expression.

Next, draw a turtle.

Then draw a whale.

Follow it up with a starfish.

Wait for awe to descend on the audience. When suitable amounts have descended - it is characterized by shrill voices yelling Madam drew a fish/turtle/whale/starfish,,,look, look - continue.

Graciously oblige further requests and draw on demand - jellyfish, sea horse, octopus, sea snail, sea anemone, and shark.

Listen to awe-stricken comments in the nature of Wooww madam, you have such nice drawing.

Bask in the glory.

Follow-up:

Bestow benign smiles on said conquests when you meet them next, and wave a royal palm at them when they yell hellos/goodbyes at you. Sure to make parents/teachers wonder at your animal magnetism.

I now have a devoted following, who sit very close to me in the hopes of there being a repeat performance the next time it rains.