Chapter 2 - Comparison

"Please sir! Can I ask you a few questions? Actually I am a student of the university on the corner, and I have to conduct a survey on elderly people", the student asked Raman nicely.

It was a great spring morning, and Raman had finally started feeling good after a long spell of dreadful winters, when he was approached by a young student who seemed stressed.

"Sure young man! But hope you don't mind sitting in the sun with me. I need some warmth as cold season raises havoc on my old joints", Raman asked in agreement.

"No problem, ummm Mr. ...?"

"Oh! Raman", he responded the question, going for a handshake.

"So Mr. Raman, let's begin the survey right away. Kindly begin by telling something about yourself", the student came straight to the point.

Catching up to the eagerness of the student, Raman began- "Well, I live right around the other corner of this block. Grew up here, spent my childhood, adulthood, and the life after. I guess life didn't give me a chance to move away from this place. I recently got retired from the National bank, as Vice President. I haven't married, and live with my servant".

"Wow! I think Mr. Raman, you would be a great person to survey, as most people I interviewed had basically a similar life. But you seem like a lone wolf, a sorted soul kinda person. Could you tell me your personal life philosophy?"

Raman went silent upon hearing the word "lone". He had a spark of a sudden realisation.

"Ah... ok! No problem. I guess I was rushing ahead. So, Mr. Raman could you tell me any favourite hobby you still practice?"

Raman's silence was unchanged.

"Okay...! Mr. Raman, what do you like to do in your free time, now?", the student asked awkwardly this time, after getting no reply of his questions.

Raman had no answer to these simple questions asked by the young student.

"Okay! Could you atleast tell me any regrets you had in your life?" the student started to get a little frustrated.

Raman stayed silent.

"So, I guess you wouldn't have any message for young people about life either", the student finally gave up, thinking that what felt like a goldmine now proved to be a lost cause for his survey. May be he was not getting any philosophies to decorate his survey with.

The student stood up and gently started to go away.

"C...Comparison...!" Raman spoke with a heavy throat.

"What?" student turned back and said.

"Comparison! You wanted to know if I had any regrets. This was my biggest and only regret", Raman finally spoke, as if a spell was casted on him.

"How come?" the student interjected, following up in the same spellbound manner.

Raman continued, wiping a tear that broke upon the spell of realisation hit him, "I guess, sometimes you need the right question to be asked to finally realise the error in your ways. Kid, you might have thought that I had lived a life and would have some great philosophical one-liners for you about how life is a particular thing. But I am afraid you got the wrong guy. All I have is a life full of regrets, whose reason just dawned on me.

I was always competitive. Or if I can frame it correctly, comparison was deep seated into my mind by the elders in my household. Ofcourse they didn't know what they were doing. When I came home with my relay-race medals, they told me that a neighbouring kid got first prize in studies; and when I got better in studies, they praised someone else for something I wasn't good at. This led me always comparing myself with others in all aspects of my life. Leaving sports, I chose studies - in which I wasn't great at. Never realised that I abandoned something I was always great at, and settled for something else.

You know they always say- Don't compare apples and oranges, well I did, almost every waking moment. That's how I got this slouched back early in my life. I chose a career with which I was always unhappy, but kept on going as I compared myself with the high achievers in the bank and pursued a goal which came with it. I achieved some of them, but it was always my happiness that was lost in the trade.

In the process of collecting my shortcomings and eyeing for the grass greener on others' side, I never got married. How can a person find a right match when he has lost himself in the pointless comparison. It never even occurred to me, that with the passing of the age I would want to grow old with someone who I can call my own."

Raman stood up with discomfort. "You know kid, they say - it's never too late to change things. It's time for me to follow that advice."

The student watched Raman walk away with the discomfort of joint pain but determination within. He stood there thinking whether he got the best interview for his survey yet, or the most precious life advice.

He felt his haste melt away.

Comparison is the thief of joy - Theodore Roosevelt