Mud, Mud, Glorious Mud

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I had to go to one of our offices access to which is restricted due to the construction of a new flyover.

Later I mentioned that I had avoided being transferred back to Pune because a workstation had been secured for me in an office in Chennai.

I failed to point out at that time, however, that these two episodes are related. I am now in the office with the under-construction flyover in front of it.

The road in front of this office is in pitiable condition. Traffic is only one-way, and restricted to a single narrow lane. There is dirt everywhere due to the construction, plus noise, dust and smoke. It’s not that bad, actually.

That is until it rains. Now we’re talking that bad. The dirt becomes, at different places, and depending upon how much water stagnates there, a combination of wet dirt, mud, slush and mire.

Yesterday, I went out of the office to look up a shop I’d visited before to see if it still existed. It was overcast when I stepped out of the office, but there was still plenty of blue skies to one side. I failed to notice the direction in which the clouds were moving. Shortly after I reached my destination (perhaps 250 metres away), the skies turned black and it started to rain heavily. And it continued to rain for an hour. Finally it relented.

By now it was the start of the evening traffic. The road was covered with both standing water and vehicles. There did not seem to be a dry way back to the office that did not involve dodging in and out of traffic. But I did notice that there seemed to be a narrow stretch of land that was not submerged under water or tyres that I could take till I got to a mound of something. If I could cross that mound, then I should be relatively safe, because there was quite a long stretch of clear pavement after that.

I made it as far as the mound. I looked at it carefully. The light was poor. It looked solid. I stepped on it. And I sank to my ankles in mire.

I use the term ‘mire’ in its most general sense, because I have no desire to analyse what it actually was. Suffice to say my shoes, socks and trousers have suffered perhaps irreparable damage. When I got home, I scrubbed my feet and legs first with hot water and soap, and then warm water and disinfectant. And the same this morning.

What was most galling about the episode is that the damaged trousers are my good khakis. And I only wore them because I couldn’t find my old khakis in the morning. I had a premonition that something bad was going to happen to those trousers as soon I put them on in the morning. As a friend to whom I related this incident later on told me, it’s what I get for breaking my own rules. Lesson learned.