The Great Holi Spuddle

The Great Holi Spuddle

It was Holi, the grand festival of colours, yesterday. Being a proud member of the exclusive (and unofficial) no-colour-no-water club, I spent the morning avoiding the efforts of the over-enthusiastic well-wishers armed with powders, water guns and balloons to cajole or drag me into their super-noisy colour party.

I had ample time on my hands. Safely ensconced inside, I started with a list of jobs to finish alone quietly. What did I actually do?

Nothing!

Well, not exactly nothing. I was seriously occupied in this and that. You know, those critically important, life-altering tasks like rearranging books on the shelf, contemplating the future with my fourth cup of chai, and scrolling through ‘happy Holi’ messages that added immense value to my day (or so I convinced myself).

Around dinner time, I counted my achievements, and there was this grand total -zero.

An intense brain-racking exercise followed and finally, my one achievement for the day was finding the word for this kind of busyness- spuddle.

Spuddle, a 17^th century word, (but now used only in parts of England), says the dictionary, means to work feebly or ineffectively, often while feeling busy but achieving/accomplishing little.  

So apt, I liked it. I wasn’t wasting time; I was spuddling! It is not the first time that the phenomenon of spuddling has happened in my life. For a huge part of my waking life - week days, weekends and holidays none excluded, I have claimed busyness, without having anything to show as a result for it in the end. I have spuddled in the past, I am spuddling in the present, and I shall continue to spuddle in future. That makes me a contender worthy of a spuddling medal!

Spuddling comes in various forms. I have spent hours trying to decide what elaborate dish to cook for dinner and then settled on regular dal, subzi or stood for a long time with my cupboard open thinking what to wear to go out and then taken out an old, worn-out, comfortable dress or exercised my grey cells over the topic for the Saturday post without any impressive outcome. Don’t you pick up the phone to check the time, and open the Facebook account, watch videos sent by your old school mates or get into a serious discussion with strangers on Zelinsky’s sartorial choice, till the device starts showing the low battery warning? That’s spuddling.

Despair not. If you ask around for what to do when caught in such a situation, the world has gyan (knowledge) about it.

It says go into the reasons for spuddling.

If you are tired, rest. Avoid doing anything important during this phase because you might be inattentive.

Analyse if the task is of value, and skip the worthless one. But if you look at it, most of what we all do in our lives seem worthless to others.

If you are distracted, try to be mindful, I was told. Though tempted to share that I had ordered mental alertness online and it should arrive in a day or two, I kept the information to myself.

One suggested that Parkinson’s Law i.e., ‘work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion’ or the completion of a task depends on the time available, applies to spuddling.

Perhaps that is true for workplaces. Aren’t the long-drawn meetings in most offices perfect examples of spuddling? People are not always procrastinating, or appearing busy just so that they are not saddled with additional tasks. They might be helping others in their tasks or merely refuelling their own energy tanks with caffeine. That is why wise bosses stress on work ethics and not necessarily, end results.

Another suggestion is to make lists, set priorities and fix deadlines.  

Oh, believe me, I have lists! Some day there can be ten things on my list but I end up doing twenty unrelated others which descend on me unannounced or take up so much time that they do not seem like productive work after all. Like calling a friend, binge-watching recipes, hacks and DIY videos I will never try, shooing away the pigeons which c**p on our balcony railing, remaking the inventory of my crochet kit or rereading some pages from a book or worrying about somebody else’s problems. All essential life skills, I assure you.

With so many years of real life behind me, I do not day dream. I am not habitually lazy, nor do I dilly-dally or lolly-gag. It is just that some days that retreat into the history of this planet never to appear again, are gone in unproductive work.

But look at it- every attempt before a discovery or invention can be counted among spuddles.

A sportsperson’s practice sessions can be considered so, as can be the whole academic year of a student, till the exams!

Isn’t all housework a humungous spuddle?

Meanwhile, the elevated souls might even ask - why should every day be a record-breaking example of productivity? Some days on the calendar should be kept open for joyful inefficiency.

Living your life to the fullest does not mean keeping your shoulder on the wheel, eyes on the ball, ears to the ground and nose to the grindstone. Pray, how does a non-contortionist achieve that?

So, switch the spuddle mode on, spuddle the day away? Haven’t I spuddled my way into writing this?

Note: My plans for the next two weeks are uncertain, so we shall meet here after a fortnight.

                                                                                                   -Anupama S Mani