A celestial commotion

Mornings in our household usually begin with us waking up to my mother’s wide grin who happens to be rather peppy and energetic in the early hours of the day when compared to the later half. But for the past few months my father and I have been waking up to exclamatory words like, “aiyyo!”, “is it??!!” , “oh my goddd!” which we know for a fact are words uttered by my mother only during an intense phone call.

The pandemic for most, has led to them following a rather monotonous work-from-home routine with the only factor that drives away the stress being their family. As a teacher, my mom and the rest of us expected her work-from-home days to be a little more relaxed and lenient. But turns out, we thought wrong. Everyday the teachers of the school are taken aback by yet another startling mail from the management which seems to ruin the rest of the day.

According to me, the school set up is somewhat in the ideal format of celestial objects in the solar system. With maybe more than just eight planets and millions of asteroids and all of them seemingly revolving around the hot headed SUN. The hierarchy of order is also quite like the sequence of planets. Mercury being the closest to the sun with no objections to anything that the raging star says. Venus is more like the mediator , a little supportive of those behind her, a little supportive of the sun and a little clueless, all together. Then comes earth with her set of privileges and skills. Diligently following the instructions dictated by the sun and meticulously completing all the work; loved by the top hated by the rest. A little guile, a tad bit artless. An all in one package. Then comes mars. As the name suggests, those grouped under this planet, question the management, wage a psychological warfare of defiance, more or less for the benefit of themselves as well as the fraction unwilling to voice out their opinion.

Those that can be grouped under Jupiter, like the planet , constitute a MASSIVE sect. A failed star nevertheless always hardworking and somewhat tenacious, at least on the surface. The rest of the teachers pretty much fall into the categories of the remaining planets. Far behind and mostly clueless. Cold (like the planet Neptune) towards any sort of happenings and unbothered and merry(like Pallas).

The sun seems to have no tolerance for any kind of acclimatization to the latest developments and rules. All work needs to be done then and there with no questions asked. If anything then, oh well consider yourself doomed by her wrath. The set up is far better than the concentration camps under the Nazis but no better than the zamindari system under the colonial rule. Obviously the consequences of rebellion being less gruesome and more verbal and subtle.

You can’t handle the tiresome schedule and no encouragement? You can resign. You don’t want to feel so compelled under this autocratic and unquestionable regime? Demoted to a lower post or same post with no scope of growth. You don’t want to attend work during such desperate times, because of susceptibility to a virus fearing your and your family’s well being? You can continue to stay home for the rest of the time, but under resignation. Whatever you choose to do must be within the orbital plane of the sun.

If one can adjust to this kind of system you can consider yourself graced by the sun, coupled with a lot of preference for several activities and also having a spotlight of your own. Sounds appealing doesn’t it? Well this sure does involve a lot of work, the most important being , not having your own conscience or moral values and turning a blind eye to all the nonsense happening around you.

While most of the planets actually do have a problem with the sun, only few raise their voices, as mentioned before. So at some point all that one could hope for is the miraculous disappearance of the sun (metaphorically) or the appearance of another form of pole star that can guide the planets to betterment and contentment , both of which is a distant reality actually and metaphorically.