"A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he.
...
Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?"
Whenever I have come across this question that how do we know whether God is there or is around us, I am reminded of these lines by Walt Whitman from his famous work "Song of Myself" wherein he explains this question is numerous ways. My favourite being these lines in which he explains that as in a handkerchief you can find the initials of its owner stitched, the grass on earth is the handkerchief of the Lord, reminding us of his presence and He Himself making his presence felt. The bunches of grass in the child's hands become a symbol of the regeneration in nature.
Personally, His presence I have experienced in many ways... You might call this silly though but I do have to say that the fact that the direction in which my life has moved has been guided by some power as i never had choices. After 12th grade, I was and still am passionate about Computers and always wanted to make a career in that field, but things turned out to be so and I landed up doing Economics at St. Stephen's College. Three years down the line I can say that it was a decision well made. The gifts that St. Stephen's has given me apart from the pleasure of being called a Stephanian are in numerous which am more than sure that no other engineering college could have given me. It also made me realize that somewhere I was never cut out to become an engineer. Computers have myriad different uses and should be used as such thus. St. Stephen's also gave me one of my most favourite and cherished teachers, Mr. Grewal.
In college, seeing my seniors and listening to other success stories and the big buck packages I always wanted to work after college. So began my struggle and efforts every summers to get some internship and all of them went in vain. Came third year, and I sat for the interviews... blame it on the recession ('coz all of them liked my CV), I did not get a job even after reaching to the final round of my dream company. At those moments something strikes you very hard because you have one failure after another and after a point the phrase "dawn after sunset" makes no sense and seems false.
However, I continued in life and came across people who showed me the other picture of the corporate world and I realized that the stress and the politics there is not meant for me. As one of my professors at Stephen's puts it... "Shoumitro you might have the money to buy Golf clubs but you don't have the time to use them..."
Well, that bent me a lot towards academics. And after graduation so I wanted to do MA. I took many entrances and ended up only at the Delhi School of Economics. Not that I was all that bad, I knew that but still I did not manage at any other place... And at one point I was in the same situation as I was after class 12. That had I not got into the Delhi School it'd have been a waste of one whole year. But that's how i guess God has channelized my life. So from hereon, I guess... it's best to leave everything unto Him and try doin' the best in whatever comes my way... I hope that the next two years would be as rocking as the past three and at the end of these to am equally proud and happy!!
