Life: Vijay Golpade - A Life More Ordinary

In these Life columns, we feature ordinary people living extremely boring and ordinary lives with good cheer, a tinge of regret, an undercurrent of despair, but nevertheless with hope for something better however bleak their situations might be, however improbable the possibility of their hopes turning to reality.

This weeks antihero, our featured average joe, is Vijay Golpade, an amiable young guy who lives his life without a purpose plodding through life wherever it leads him. On a routine day, Vijay goes to work, chats with his workmates, comes back to his tiny shack, smokes a few ciggies, bumps into his neighbors, screams at his wife of nine years, scolds his kids, throws a few pebbles at barking dogs, hums a tune or two, drifts off to sleep. On a non-routine day, he goes to work, gets scolded by his supervisor, gets ragged mercilessly by his workmates, comes back to his tiny shack, smokes a few extra ciggies, bumps into his landlord, gets a dressing down from his wife of nine years, gets taunted by his kids, throws a few pebbles at dogs barking at him, gets irritated at everyone humming tunes, drifts off to sleep. On a special day, which mostly comes once a fortnight, sometimes just once a month, his wife agrees to fuck him.

In his 37 years of existence, Golpade has trudged his way through school, failed attempts to graduate from college, mountain of debt accrued from marrying off his sister after the untimely death of his father without leaving him a penny, string of poorly-paid jobs, a somewhat successful marriage and an occasional trip to Shirdi or a vacation at Lonawala.

"I like singing and I think with some training I might become a middling to good singer. Though my voice tends to crack while singing high notes, with little bit of training I might learn to sing at few octaves lower. Sometimes I wish I should audition for at least the 'Bathroom Singer' show, but my wife starts laughing hysterically every time I talk about it and pleads me to spare her the embarrassment" said Golpade to our reporter.

His wife, Premlata, denied that she laughs hysterically whenever he talks about auditioning for TV shows. "Yes, I do laugh off his ideas of becoming a television star and sometimes its difficult to control my laughter at his daydreams, but I would never intentionally hurt him by laughing hysterically at his face" she said with a smile, offering a plate of cookies. "I too do wish that he should do something with his life, set goals for himself, take charge of his life and try to make things happen. But when I talk about goals, I mean realistic, achievable goals that would better his life and help create a good future for our kids, not silly day-dreams of becoming a talent-show participant."

"I'm quite content with my life" countered Vijay, "Things could have been better, but my life isn't too bad. I got a job, a roof to live under, a good wife who serves me food twice a day, two great kids, friendly co-workers, tolerable boss, nice neighbors, my ciggies and my music"

Not true actually. A lousy job, just a roof and four walls, a nagging wife who denies him frequent fucks till he gets going in his life, two kids whose future looks as bleak as his own, nasty co-workers, brute of a boss, tolerable neighbors, ciggies which will eventually kill his lungs and delusions of musical talent.

But like every ordinary person living with hope and good cheer, Vijay Golpade likes to look at the glass of his life as half full, even as he finishes off another boring day failing to set any goal or achieve anything substantial.