Two months at work

Today I have successfully completed two months of my first job. As a pre-requisite of becoming a full fledged embedded systems’ engineer i am slowly learning to deal with the monstrous Linux operating system, and steadily beginning to write some pages of kernel code. With the first two salaries in my bank account and my brand new debit card in my hand I feel proud; proud that I am worth something. But the next moment I recall that I am still a probationary engineer and there are still four screwing months to go ahead before I come out of the training state and get absorbed in the company. Nevertheless, I try to enjoy what I have gained in these two busy months.

All the knowledge of microcontrollers and microprocessors which I had gained during my B.Tech degree course is helping me a lot. However Linux was something I had never worked upon before and, until two months ago, was totally alien to me. But now I feel extremely excited about it. I now know a few of its commands and some of the concepts behind it. Kernel and boot loader, what I knew before, were something which really existed in any functional system but I had no idea of how they were framed and what was the concept behind them. But now! Now I am reading more than 2000LOCs of code of boot loader daily and learning about the actual role of kernel in initialization of peripherals. I have given a presentation on interrupt handling and kernel synchronization and its repercussions are I cannot take my mind out of ‘interrupts and interrupt handler’!

My work environment is extremely good and i am fortunate enough to get the best mentor as my boss! He is always on his toes to clarify my doubts and helps me understand some concepts. He is extremely disciplined and sincere towards his work and answers all my silly questions with patience and attention.  In addition to this, my colleagues are also very supportive and co-operative. My family is helping me a lot.  And the most important point is I am enjoying what I am doing!

However in-spite of all the positive fillings, there is some lacunae in my life. It is the loneliness and void created because of absence of my college friends. Like me, they are also busy in their new jobs and courses. However, we try to be in communication with each other through messages and phone calls. We frame plans to meet every weekend but something or the other happens and, needless to say, our plan hardly gets executed. Every alternate day or so I watch the video which I had created with some of the pictures of our beautiful college days. I then get lost in my nostalgic college memories- the outings, the fun, the classes, the bunks, the lunch, the labs, and everything. I miss the minors, the majors, the library, the canteen, the basketball court, the administrative department, and our Sunila madam too. I keep on looping in and endless loop of eternal memories with no handler function designed to help me come out back in the user space. Only my friends can fill lacunae of mine completely and I wish this happens soon.