HARD TO DECIDE!

It’s the thirteenth of May’09. It’s a local holiday here, thanks to the elections and it’s a holiday for me to decide. It’s not always that I get this chance to decide and I don’t want to let this moment pass. I am sure that if I do not decide now, I am not going to be able to “decide”, for some time to come. I have a list of at least 13 possible decisions I can make. I needed help here. It’s not so easy when it’s your decision that matters. I turned to the veterans for help.
First, I asked my mom. Well, I don’t know why I keep doing this, coz I am completely aware that to every one of my issues, my mother’s sole responsibility to help will be in her listing out all possible outcomes of every decision possible. In the end, you are left with not just 10 more options since you started off with, but you are now morally responsible for any decision you make. Darn mothers! I was looking for a way out and ended up with a road block and a dozen SWAT teams pointing their laser beam at me! She now has my list of 13, double itself. I am amazed at the options I had not even bothered to consider. She goes on to suggest I take the help of her friends in Coimbatore. No, thanks, they are ALL mothers too. I can’t risk loosing my list of options among the files of options they might come up with.
I turn to Dad. Dad is the more subtle version of me. I usually take the most insane route out of a problem and then laugh at it. My dad is the kind of guy who takes the most insane route out of a problem and stops at every step to swear at me for following him on this fool’s errand! He narrowed down my options. He gave all his reasons for ruling out half of my options and said he did not know what made me choose the other half for options! I scored out all the options he picked. I was getting somewhere. You cannot take my dads decisions at face value. You have to process them. Dad is careful with decisions. He analyzes decisions so deep that by the time he decides, his turn is over.
Armed with the renewed and shortened list, I picked the phone to call my Gramps. Gramps loves it when someone needs a spot of help. Always glad to help and no strings attached. Sometimes it’s so darn supportive that he is spontaneous with suggestions and sometimes it’s just out of the blue. I knew I had to approach him with caution coz I know how his decisions are driven. It’s never just about him. He is cautious of the repercussions of his decisions. So, when you go to him, you never ask for his decisions. You give him your decision and get his ideas on possible repercussions. I did not need this right now. It can wait. I still have not made my mind up.
Well, I don’t usually go to my friends straight. I know for a fact that they think exactly as I do and they will not be much of a help when you are confused, they are bound to be confused to be confused too. I was right. My friend here, was not much of a help in saying, “what do you want to do?”. Dude, I asked you just about the same thing. We ought to have been twins. I called up my uncle (first time in my life I’m calling him my uncle) to find out what he would do. He’s in Bangalore. We talked for 25 minutes over the internet, gave up thanks to the lousy connection and took to the good ‘ol expensive mobile conference. Chatted for another 10 minutes. I still have no idea why our conversation included nothing but the bullets we owned and the trips we were planning. My colleagues were no help whatsoever. They were all seeping on the paid holiday.
I gave up trying to score off the options from my list of possible homes and hotels to lunch on the holiday and ended up cooking at home!