Seventeen-Inch World

Seventeen-Inch World


I vividly remember the childhood time when my father used to take me to the busiest markets in the city. For most this should have been one of the happiest moments, but not for me.

Being short I had to hold his hand all the time and struggled to match his pace. The oncoming people somehow could never spot me and their belongings smashed right into my face with military precision. As years passed on, I was allowed to walk on my own and I had grown taller so the punching also came down. Rather than feeling sorry I used to get a feeling of vengeance if I accidentally happened to dash some kid in a crowd.

As years passed, the memories of the local market faded away with career taking precedence over everything in life. Recently on being persuaded I agreed to accompany my mother to buy groceries from a local market on a lazy Sunday.

Within minutes of stepping in the market, I was amused to see my mother a perennial miser, arguing furiously with a hawker like it was a matter of life and death. The entire hullabaloo was just for being charged a rupee more on a kilo of potatoes. I could not help but wonder about the stark difference between her and myself. I usually ensure that I squander a few hundred rupees in a multiplex just to feel cool whereas my mother was hell bent on squeezing out the last penny out of the poor guy.

I couldn’t help but grinning in the middle of the road glancing at the vendor. Suddenly came the
Deep voice, "This module isn’t working...Oh my God, this module isn’t working". With my dazed eyes, I had a second look and tried to make sense of what I just heard. The contorted face started to get familiar with each passing milli-second. It was my manager.

The heat from his red-hot face instantly vaporized all the train of thoughts and in a jiffy I immersed myself in the seventeen-inch world, otherwise called as a Computer Monitor. I had spent the entire the night thinking about the market and how it was a vital part of my life without even realizing it. Life of a software engineer is not that easy after all.