Chapter 1 - Time is Money

As a child, I always wanted to go "somewhere". But honestly, I did not really pay too much attention as to why I want to simply get away from the cozy comfort of the house and spend a significant amount of time somewhere else. I still do not understand this very well but I can sense now that my need to take a break or a vacation is not very purposeless as it was in my yesteryears. I guess the reason for that cannot simply be money. It has to be time..time that I can spend to do nothing...or may be "something". 

Saswat always asked me where I wanted to go for our honeymoon. I really did not have a true answer because, as I mentioned, my thoughts were so random that I never thought about it seriously. Also "honeymoon" in itself is bit of a conundrum to me. It still is. I see pics of newlyweds going to a nice place, sun-kissed dresses, sipping that martini in an exquisite private location, inaccessible from the world; just them and no one else; taking lots of pictures to be framed and cherished later.  I bet it's super romantic or is it? I do not know. Nevertheless, I used to tell Saswat that I want to go to New Zealand. Honestly speaking, I was just a fake. Until the visa arrived and the tickets were booked, I did not even care to look it up in the map. I think I was still like a child, wanting to go "somewhere".

Anyway, our "honeymoon" is in a stand-by mode for reasons most of you already know. And while we are in this mode, I will try to think harder and find the true purpose of taking the trip and continue that part of the story later on.

Before going further, I want to highlight one more flaw in me. I am not very good at time management. While balancing work, gym, cooking, cleaning, music lessons, meeting friends, calling my parents in weekends, watching Game of Thrones and paying bills without late fees, as correctly prioritized here, I honestly do not have time to "plan for a trip". Saswat comforts me by saying that our jobs are hard. That it is accounted for not by the hours spent in office but by the work produced at the end. I agree with him. Both our jobs are tough. It involves making the correct decisions at each point, understanding complex things, designing complex systems that should stand the test of time. If this was science, it would have been easy. But as I understand it better today, designing a software is more an art than science. Hence, it's so difficult. It also requires lot of prework as any other art form.

So coming back to my point, I am simply running against time. I have developed this restlessness in me these days, as if I am getting older and there is so much to do and there is so little time. In such a situation, when I have to plan and prepare for a trip..sometimes I feel it's more of a hassle than anything else and that I am better off staying at home. But this time, I thought that we both deserved a break. After all, we did not get to do our New Zealand trip and we both went through the toughest of times in our lives in the last 6 months.  To celebrate the recovery process, we chose Alaska. Again, this seems to be one of the unconventional places to go; especially after a patella realignment surgery, but nevertheless this seemed like our calling.