Friday, June 13, 2008

All work, no fun

Dhanno comes back home after a 8-hour day in school, lugging her 14 kilo bag in the afternoon sun. She is sweaty, hot, tired, cranky. She doesn't take too kindly to my invitation to fool around a bit.

She looks at me, snuggled up in bed with a book in my hand, and says angrily, "I am tired. I've been working."

I say, "I've been working too since you went to school."

She raises an eyebrow.

"After you left, I spent about an hour and a half, taking care of the plants, shifting them around, and what-not."

"That's your hobby."

"Then I worked on my script the entire morning."

"That's fun."

"Then I cooked some chicken for lunch."

"You like doing that. It's not like you have to do chemistry. Which is so-o-o boring."

"I'm not asking you to study chemistry. I'm not asking you to go to school. In fact, I've been asking you to leave school for the last 5 years."

She looks at me as if I am a hopeless case, and walks off. Nothing can convince her that what I do is work, unless I look more miserable about it.

6 comments:

dipali said...

Lovely post! So, are you practising a miserable expression now?

Banno said...

Yes, Dipali, working hard at it.

Indeterminacy said...

I've found that work you enjoy can be made unpleasant if someone stands over your shoulder watching you.

Manjushree Abhinav said...

Oh, come on, we all went through utter misery at school, didn't we? In fact, I still hate the concept.
I would have been a better man today if I had altogether skipped school. I really wish I had the courage, and the patience to home school Pavan.

Banno said...

Oh yes, Indie. The worst is someone peeking over your shoulder when you are reading.

Grasshopper, Teja and I've been trying to persuade Dhanno to leave school for years. But she loves it. All her friends! If only she didn't have to study.

Anonymous said...

Ha ha...how true! [Reminds me of the character 'Tadpole', Petite's daughter, in http://www.petiteanglaise.com

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