Colleague - A blog on every pro to fun

 For the first six months of my business, I ran everything from MyBusinessName_88@gmail.com. I know, I know. I can feel the collective cringe from entrepreneurs everywhere. In my defense, it was easy. It was free. And it worked. But with every email I sent, I felt a tiny pang of imposter syndrome. Nothing screams "this is just a side hustle" quite like an email address that includes an underscore and your birth year. The breaking point came when I was trying to land my first major client. I had my proposal ready, my website looked polished, and my services were dialed in. I typed out the email, hit send... and then stared at my "Sent" folder. The email, coming from MyBusinessName_88, just felt... amateur. It was like wearing a sharp suit with a pair of old, muddy sneakers. I decided right then: it was time to level up. Thus began the great "business email" quest. I dove into a sea of options, and it was immediately more confusing than I expected. First, th...

The frantic energy of Diwali week in Kanpur had finally subsided. The endless client meetings were done, the last of the orders shipped. As I sat in my quiet office on the evening of October 31st, 2025, the distant pop of firecrackers was the only thing breaking the silence. This year, however, I had one last, important celebration planned before heading home. For the past five years, the backbone of my business has been my secretary, Anjali. She's the calm in every storm, the one who remembers everything from a client's child's name to the intricate details of a contract. This year, I wanted to acknowledge that her dedication is a light in my professional life, just as deserving of celebration as the diyas I would light at home. I had asked her to stay back for a few minutes, and when she walked into my office, her expression was one of polite curiosity. Her eyes, however, widened in surprise when she saw the small table I had set up. On it sat two beautifully decorated bo...

The air in our ancestral home in Lucknow had grown thick with unspoken words. For months, ever since our parents passed, my younger brother, Rohan, and I had been circling the inevitable topic: what to do with the house. This wasn't just any property; it was the house our father built, the one with the sprawling neem tree in the courtyard where we’d spent countless summer afternoons, the one whose walls held the echoes of our childhood. And now, it was becoming the reason we couldn't look each other in the eye. The problem was simple, yet deeply complex. I, the elder brother, lived in another city with my family. My job was demanding, and the idea of managing a property from afar was daunting. For me, selling seemed like the most logical, practical solution. The money would be a significant help for both our families. Rohan, however, saw things differently. He still lived in Lucknow, just a few neighbourhoods away. For him, selling the house felt like erasing our parents' l...

It’s 11 PM. The house is quiet, and the only light comes from the phone in my hand, casting a blue glow on my face. My thumb hovers over his profile picture, a familiar ritual that has become both a comfort and a curse. We broke up six months ago, but in the digital world, we’ve never been further apart—or more painfully connected. When we were together, our social media was a shared canvas. A tag in a photo from our weekend trip, a silly comment on a post, the simple, public marker of ‘In a relationship with…’. Our digital lives were intertwined, creating a beautiful, public tapestry of our love story. Then, the story ended. But the tapestry remained. Chapter 1: The Digital Museum In the first few weeks after the breakup, I couldn’t stop myself. His profile was a museum of what we used to be, and I was its most dedicated visitor. I’d scroll back months, even years, staring at a photo of us smiling at a concert, my comment underneath reading, “Best night ever ❤️”. Each post was a relic...

The silence at our dinner table had become heavier than the air before a monsoon. We’d be sitting across from each other, the aroma of a simple home-cooked meal between us, but the distance felt like miles. The elephant in the room wasn't just big; it was stamping its feet, and its name was my salary. When Priya and I moved in together, we were high on love and dreams. We planned weekend trips, talked about saving for a bigger place, maybe even a dog. We were a team. But somewhere along the way, the financial reality started to creep in. I work in a field I'm passionate about—graphic design for a small non-profit. It's fulfilling, but it doesn't come with a hefty paycheck. Priya, on the other hand, is excelling in her corporate marketing job. Her salary grew, and with it, a subtle shift in our dynamic. It started with small things. "My friends are all going to Thailand for a week, shouldn't we plan a trip?" she'd ask, her eyes sparkling with excitement...

When I first met Rohan, he introduced himself with a firm handshake, a confident smile, and a title. "Rohan," he said, "Business Development Executive." The title hung in the air, crisp and professional, like the starched collar of his shirt. In my mind, a "Business Development Executive" was a species of human I'd only seen in corporate dramas. Someone who lived in a world of targets, leads, and conversions. Someone who probably saw every conversation as a potential networking opportunity. And for the first few weeks of knowing him, Rohan did little to change that impression. Our early interactions were always in group settings. He’d be on the phone, pacing and talking about "Q4 projections" and "strategic alliances." He had a way of making "let's circle back on that" sound like a profound statement. He was charismatic and driven, but there was a professional gloss to him that felt impenetrable. I was a friend of a fr...

It started, as many modern friendships do, as a casual add-on. "I'm meeting my friend Sameer for drinks, he's bringing his girlfriend," the text read. In my mind, a vague, stock image formed. I didn't mean for it to, but the label "Software Engineer's Girlfriend" came with its own set of preconceived notions, like a default CSS style sheet for a person. I pictured someone who was either also in tech, ready to talk shop about APIs and agile methodologies, or someone completely outside of it, patiently nodding along, her eyes glazing over as the conversation inevitably drifted towards debugging and deployment cycles. When I met Anika, she was neither. Our first few hangouts were exactly as predicted. The conversation was a triangle. Sameer and my other tech friends would be at two points, deep in a discussion about a new JavaScript framework, and Anika and I would be the third, making small talk about the weather, the terrible traffic in Kanpur, or how...