“Yes Ma’am, just for you!”, said the driver of the bus I was in, to a lady who enquired if it would take her to the USC health science campus, situated a few miles away. She hopped right in, beaming. I got a ‘transfer’, so to say, for my last couple of months at work. Not only have I made some good friends, but have the opportunity to meet and greet quite a lot of doctors every day. The campus is swarming with students and others in different colored ‘scrubs’ – that is what their uniforms are called. No job can be boring if it involves talking to new people every day.

A frenzied week at work because the manager was on vacation made sure we spent each day in anticipation of the weekend. I started cooking soon after I reached home on Friday evening, trying to get my ‘payasam’ – a sweet dish, to be delectable as my friends were visiting over the weekend. I was trying to imitate my parents, who made it every time we had guests over. If there is payasam at home, it is an indication of something special. And like my father says, life is a celebration! When I was stirring it to perfection, I received a phone call to join a couple of friends for a horror movie at a place in LA which is apparently very unsafe. We changed our minds and watched a spy movie, which was not bad.

Come Saturday evening and I was at the Griffith observatory, a must-visit for anybody in LA for the first time. After spending a lot of time standing in a queue for a chance to look through a telescope and giving up, we wasted more time waiting for a friend to maneuver through the traffic and pick us up. Our “first-time-in-LA” friend had to get to Irvine that night and had to get on the train that leaves at 7:40 PM from the Union station. We made alternative plans on the way, but managed to reach there at 7:38 PM. She went inside, saw the train leave as she got to the platform and came back. Here we were, ready to put our fallback plans into action. Off we went to the Huntington beach after a brief stop at home. We crashed a party at a friend’s place near the beach, met some genial people and played a game called ‘Rage cage’ and went for a walk on the pier at midnight. The pier was crowded, some of which I attribute to the US open of surfing slated to start the next day and most to the craze for Pokémon Go!

Amid all the fun and other worries, I am on a quest to find inspiration in people around me and was exposed to how those who have suffered losses in life easily get along and nurture an affinity for each other. Moreover, how easily they smile and do not give away a hint of their sorrow without being asked. When it was easy for me to judge someone purely based on what I encountered for a couple of hours, little did I realise that I have lost the ability to perceive anybody’s actions to be just a manifestation of what they have seen in life, and not an attempt to manipulate others. In short, I have forgotten how to give people a chance, how to trust them. If someone is trying desperately to make a failing relationship work, it could be because they have lost all those who meant anything to them and they are too afraid to lose any more. If someone advises you to groom yourself and look better, it might be because they have experienced how difficult it is to be taken seriously without being presentable.

I cannot help but admire the manager at work, a fifty-five-year-old lady who sings along to every familiar song playing off the radio, with absolutely no inhibitions. I bet, given a chance, she would start dancing too. I wish we could all be as easygoing as she is. Not once has she raised her voice and in fact, she calms us down when we cannot hide our exasperation at the end of the day.

I have no dearth of philosopher-friends too, who sometimes share a three-point agenda to fix everything, sometimes are all ears to all that I have to say and sometimes suggest downing some beer and chilling to forget all problems. What is life without a little bit of misadventures, after all!