Life - as it unfolds!

I have this very strong notion in my head - that nothing comes without planning, without working hard towards getting it. Whenever I see people of my generation having a seemingly good life - in the high earning spectrum, married by a certain age, living in a newly constructed (or still under construction!) house, with European cars and holidays - I think - it may look effortless, but it is not. 

I believe the smart working class people, have increasingly started 'planning' life. Every move is calendarised, every information organised, every event managed. Always - in control; of everything. 

And when I flew out of the nest, I almost instinctively started to do the same - plan, plan and plan!! I have spent a lot of my life being sequential - A after B, Y not before X and so on. I have tried to think ahead, manage my future. I find these words from Wolf Hall (Hilary Mantel) unforgettable - "It is all very good to have a plan for next year, couple of years or 5 years, but is no good to not have a plan for tomorrow"

I have learnt, that it is in this tiny unplanned tomorrow that life happens!

Quite a few turning points in my life have come out of turn (pun intended). Further education - planned? Not until I actually filled in the form. Working in the UK - planned? Not until weeks before time to fly back. Getting married - not even after being engaged!!!

Still - I have not given up on planning, and rather have dragged S into it! Someone who has lived for now most of his life, must find it so strange, but still appreciates my point of view :) I do think planning reaps rewards and definitely is not harmful! But what it does or rather has done to me is - made me wary of surprises, cautious of unexpected things, and scared of sudden decisions. 

What we did today is super awesome, long due, and eagerly awaited :) I have been so looking forward to this! But when it happened, it happened suddenly and my feelings got punctuated by my overly planned mind.

I am sorry S, and well done you :)

Cromwell

Wolf Hall - it is a soap opera in a book. Hilary Mantel has woven a an irresistible fabric of romance, jealously, politics, family and history. 

To say that the book is about Tudors is a bit unfair. It is more about the relationship between two men in power- one deriving from the other. 

Henry Tudor - a king who's questioned by entire Europe, who's position is weakened by his marital status. 

A king without an earnest adviser. 

Thomas Cromwell - An opportunist. A pragmatic trader who knows how to turn any obstacle into a boulder to step on.

Hilary has brought these two characters together beautifully. Each encompassed with his own set of domestic and political issues, each haunted by a wife who is no more. 

I would have never thought I would like to read a political book, but Wolf Hall has it so finely ingrained in  the whole plot that one doesn't realise when history morphs into dirty politics.

I am surprised how relevant this is all these centuries later. Shrewd men like Cromwell are making their way up the ladder - the cooperate one if not regal. Connections, obligations, favours still drive the who's with who equation. And how important it is to have an 'image' that is liked by all.

Only an author of great(?) capabilities could pull it through.

I know my review of the book has done no justice to the book, plot, characters or the author, but I am a firm believer of something is better than nothing.