Peter Pan-esque

It has been a dreary couple of months - the last week has been the worst. A friend is sufferring from a illness which has no physical manifestations, and an illness which most people would make fun of.(the D word darling!) Sometimes I feel partly responsible because I ignored my friend when I was needed the most. Wrapped in my own thoughts, I did not bother to enquire about hir** at all. But hir is "limping back normalcy" slowly and hopefully all will be soon be right with my world.

Also lots of people leaving MEI - people I knew, people I loved, people I liked. With each leaving, an era ends. MEI becomes slightly more different than it was before if that oh-so-familiar face is not in the canteen, collonade, seashore or library. What is life if there is no one to share late night multi-hour 'information exchanges' with?

Perhaps all this is just a symptom of the high stress life that being in fifth year entails. you know post doc searching, thesis writing, paper writing, boss fighting, recco getting and all that. interspersed with frantic searches on Pubmed to see what your batchmates have been upto for the past five years, regretfully realising that they have done better than you while you devoted yourself to wine, man and song. Literally.

Now its time face the world. start worrying about money, housing, stock options, money, babies, jobs, visas, passports, money, some serious work perhaps, mid-life crises, in-laws, etc and money too.

** - hir - new article which is gender independant. could mean him OR her. can also be used in place of he OR she.

*** - MEI - My Esteemed Institute - a well known and reputed research insitute in India which I study in, but I will not name, lest Google give me away.