Routines … love them or hate them…still follow them!

The Ganesh festival is round the corner. Across India and maybe even around the world this is one routine that all the Ganesh devotees love. My family celebrates the festival too! The preparations start much before the D-day at our place. Not so much in terms of making the goodies for the feast or the decorations for Ganesh murti. It’s more in terms of setting stage for the expected schedule of events that will unfold for the 2 days that the family meets. The time of puja, the lunchtime, the arguments over breakfast at Mani’s, the menu for Prasad lunch and everything else is absolutely predictable routine. The guest list is predictable, so are the entry and exit lines of the guests. The conversation topics of the close family are the same every year. The close circle enjoys taking pot shots at the distant relatives who drop in for Prasad. The relatives I am sure do the same, once they depart after feasting on the mouth-watering Prasad for lunch. Its absolute routine stuff. Nevertheless, it’s a routine that all of us enjoy! It starts with planning what will be the surprise announcements, which are privately circulated to all members of the family, who then suitably act surprised and happy for the announcements. It ends with all family members promising to plan a picnic so as to improve the bonding and declarations of keeping in touch!

Another interesting routine that we go through - en masse - starts unfolding in month of May. We start speculating the arrival of rains. Invariably the rains are late. Then we worry our heads over the delay and discuss the fall out of global warming. Finally when the rains arrive, we wish that it would stop raining so that life would be free of dirt, grime and rotting garbage. It does not end here. When the rains start receding we get into the famous panic of the lakes and water reservoirs not being full! The beautiful aspect of the rains is the almost routine rainy day picnic to a nearby hill-station, getting soaked to the last fibre and then huddling together for the steaming corn on the cob along with hot bhajiyas and a cup of cup. Wow!

Talking about picnics, I am reminded of the routine that my husband and I go through every 15 days of late. We talk about taking a vacation and the burning need to take time off from routine J Most of my friends also follow the routine of discussing and planning of a holiday for self and family. But none of us convert it into a reality! Most of us are at a stage in our careers where long absence is not possible OR may be dangerous ;). If all that is sorted, then we are faced with the challenge of coinciding the dates when all members can be away from their respective routines. So all in all, we have developed a routine of planning a holiday. Just to break the routine!

Some routines are traditional. For instance, every South Indian girl is enrolled in a dance and singing class as a matter of routine. It’s a given task, never questioned by anyone in the community. I have also seen them loving this routine. Or take the case of a routine enquiry thrown at all newlywed couples. Every couple faces the enquiry about when will they give the good news – read as expecting a baby - irrespective of caste, religion, geography and social status. The only change to this tradition, nowadays is the time when the enquiries start rolling in. In olden days the enquiry would start within 3 months of the marriage. Today the elders of the family are willing to hold their aspirations for as many as 5 years!

Some routines are customary. Like washing feet and covering your head before entering a place of worship, be it anywhere in India.

We are at times not even conscious of some of the routines that each one of us follows. One of them, I think is praying to the Almighty in times of difficulty and crisis. I know a lady who is a complete Atheist. She professes that she does not believe in the concept called God. So much so that when we were traveling to various locations in India, she refused to enter those places of interests i.e. monuments where people also pray and worship. I was surprised by this extreme display of atheist values. Yet, I saw her pray – which she denies – with her hands folded and clasped together, kneeling on the floor and eyes tightly shut, when her sister was supposedly caught in the recent terrorist attacks at a city hospital.

Some routines are fashionable. Like falling in love. Most of the population on this earth goes through motions of love in teens – used to be late teens in my time, but it is early teens these days. This routine is almost always accompanied by the high drama of parents not approving and the kidults (wonder who coined this word!) rebelling, followed by eventual fall out and settling down for more compatible acceptable prospects.

In my professional life, I have seen (and also been a party to!) folks invariably going through the routine of appreciating the previous employer as against the current one. I have observed that for most of us, the previous employer always seems to have the best practices and standard processes. It’s so convenient to forget that almost all of us are equally dissatisfied with the ex-employer while working there, isn’t it?

I use a routine to break the monotonous weekly routine. Confused? Don’t be. I am simply talking about my Saturday routine. I look forward to all Saturdays because it breaks the routine of the weekdays. It gives me respite from dancing to the tune of wall clock on weekdays. However, funnily enough, my Saturdays are also a routine. I get up late, laze in the bed, say bye to the husband, make myself a cup of tea, surf the net till I am hungry, fix a brunch, eat while watching TV and watch TV while dozing, almost reluctantly go into the bedroom and sleep soundly, until being rudely woken up by some caller… and so on and so forth. I simply love this routine Saturday. It’s my day!

I am sure all of us have personal routines that we enjoy. And I am not referring to the mundane routines of waking up, brushing teeth, crapping, having tea, taking shower, getting ready, going to work and so on till we sleep and wake up again. I am sure there are routines unique to every person. Be it a dance routine or an exercise regime or a visit to someone special or a shopping spree in weekend bazaars. It exists!

There is no escaping the routines. Its inevitable just like the seasonal routine of Nature around us. Its as true as the birth and death routine of life. We get bored of the routine and often feel like running away. We seek new things to do. We crave for adventure and challenge. We move to newer pastures. All to break from the routine! But there is no denying that inspite of all the breaks that we may take and new things that we may pursue, we still lapse into routines.

There is a comfort in it, isn’t it?