Time and again...

I met my man who was a boy 16 years ago. We have been together since 12 years. Both of us fought over many things and moved on as either wisdom donned or we hit upon the solution. Now I see many young couples around me who are going through the teething years of getting together as partners. Though my journey seemed very unique because we are very different people and our situations and contexts were differnt blah blah it is interesting to see a pattern.

I know these are all bits and pieces of power struggle and so many other things like one needs to accept the other, is there love and respect, are people flexible enough, issues of gender sensitivity and patriarchy and so on. It is still interesting to see..

Scenario 1: Who likes to do what?

He told me that he is comfortable washing dirty dishes, clothes and anything under the sun, but he can not sweep the house because he does not like it. I said I dont mind doing anything as I know how to do them there is no particular task that I like for the sake of it, but I love cooking as it is very therepeutic. So what happened next? Though I wanted him to do the work of washing clothes, dishes and so on.. I started noticing that he does not do it so well and wastes lot of water. I felt the need to correct him and show him how it is done properly!! patriarchy seeped in to the extent where I felt the need to be the expert. It is not like he was trying to discover a new element and I am his guide, he would have figured out eventually the methods which are comfortable and so on as he is also above average intelligent guy. I set myself up to wash clothes, sweep the house and cook!! One fine day I realised that I am doing more or less everything and flew off the handle the moment he uttered 'can I help you?'... I ranted about how it is not helping me, it is what is needed for maintaining the household, I am not responsible alone, this wont do and what do you mean help me? Why cant this be shared equally and so on. Things became better after I ranted and we discusssed. So we started making weekend home maintenance task list. This list consisted of two columns tasks in one and who will do it in the other. So as soon as it was made (by me), he would take it first because I asked him to pick tasks first, he invariably ticked majority of them and in the evening we used to check and see that I ended up doing the majority!! Either it indicates that I am a control freak or as women we are conditioned to look at chores in a different way. So if I am cooking lunch, cleaning up the kitchen counters, dusting the shelves and dusting the elctronic items in the kitchen go hand in hand. While he would go and clean the commode though the task consists of scrubbing the bathroom floor, washing down the door, defogging the mirror and so on. That is how he understood it. Initially I got innocent compliments from him that while I clean the bathroom, some how it looks more cleaner and better!! The list and sharing of what is implicit in an explicit manner helped. Now we are equal partners wrt household needs. I see this fight happening in different degrees and different contexts around me.

Scenario 2: My friends, your friends and our friends:

I did not like many of his friends and he did not like many of mine. I felt his friends were stuck in boyhood and are deeply patriarchal, he thought my friends were pseudo intellectuals and pompous. So I went to his friends gatherings' with my nose up and he came to mine with his forehead knotted. We no longer have those deeply patriarchal or pompous ones in our lives. But this did cause some heartache in the first Act of our marriage. Now our friends are the ones who are great with both of us and we have our own individual circle of friends who are accepted lovingly by the other.

Scenario 3: If we love each other so much, how can we fight? How dare you not fight back? Am I investing more here than you? Why do you shut me off? Why do you yell at me?

Figuring out the fighting style that suits us so that things move forward and get closure than towards festering is an art which has to be learnt by each couple. There are no shortcuts to this process. We are active aggressor + passive aggressor combination on many days, it changes to one weepy hormonal entity + one bewildered soul on some days and one subtle manipulator + one subtle resistor or on some days and so on. All these styles keep on happening. Some styles have been retired by us over the years as they were mushrooming the issue at hand into something else. The first time my active aggressor yelled at him, he stood up, looked at me with deeply hurt expression and marched out of the house. He came back after an hour of walking and by then my anger had turned into panic. As soon as he came home, I hugged him and said sorry and he hugged back and said sorry. He whispered in my ears 'please dont yell at me' and that is the last time I yelled at him. When we feel like my aggressor supreme and his great resistor are getting ready to march in, we have taken a step back and have taken notebooks and writing to communicate what we are feeling. That has worked, along with many other things which we have found to be useful. We have also understood that it is better to share 'what I feel' than to say 'what you did'. I see couples struggling to understand their fighting and I witness the frustration and sadness when repetitively unyielding styles are used. Since there is no short cut here, it has to go on to give way to new harmony. I am also not saying that we no longer fight and have attained sainthood but we definitely know the difference between the issue and the person and how to go about it (majority of the times ahem). 

I am not an expert in relationships and I will not advise what one needs to do in theirs. All the relationship needs is love and trust in the process.

We saved his life - true story!

I was may be 8 years old. Happy playing with the 3 month old fox terrier pup, getting scared when my big brother said 'Kashmoooraaaaaa', embarrassing amma when she took me to her friends' homes by blurting out 'I am hungry', getting mid night whacks from my sister when I wet the bed and she had to change sheets as well as my clothes, secretly dreaming and being thrilled about my fathers green trunk as my friend told me she thinks it is full of money! Holding Hari's hand (who was 10 and some months old then) while crossing the road and listening to him say the same sentence every day 'come near my School as soon as yours is over' and I responded with a big nod while moving towards my class as unwillingly as a French convict facing the guillotine.

I did not yet know real sadness or trauma or drama even for that matter. One fine day, I was in School and my brother’s friend came to fetch me. My teacher looked sad and shocked as she spoke to him outside the classroom and she said ‘Aparna, please go with him, you are excused from the class’. For me I knew the friend and he told me guess what jokes when he came home so I skipped away from school happily behind him. (Guess what! Amma is gummy, appa is thorny but the sons are like Amitabh Bachchan – guess what is it? Answer: Jack fruit! clap clap clap)

He had come in his cycle, instead of making me sit in the front and pedal away, he started walking pushing the cycle and told me ‘Little one (putti) your anna had an accident, one more friend has gone to fetch Hari (my other brother), we need to go to the hospital ok?’. I said ok.

I did not know the meaning of accident and related hospitalization. Till we reached the hospital, I was happy about skipping School that day. When I reached, my mother, sister and brother were already there. We went to see where my brother was. We were taken to the general ward; all the beds were full with patients and their attendants. We searched for the familiar face of my brother and someone in the entourage said ‘here he is’.

All cots in the general ward were taken so they had made a makeshift arrangement on the floor with a bed and related sheets. The person who was on it had a fully swollen face – especially his right eye. I did not recognise him. He was unconscious. Amma was hysterical asking people – why is he not awake? what happened? Where is the doctor? Why is he on the floor? Please shift him to private ward and so on.

Naanna was away attending to his office work. He was informed. We were assured that as soon as the private ward is vacant he will be shifted. He was hit on the head by a fast cricket ball while playing the match and a neuro surgeon is coming from Bangalore (or some place) to examine him.

Nanna came and private ward opened up. He was shifted. I did not yet know the significance of him being unconscious for one and half days, I was not around when the neuro surgeon examined him, I did not yet know how lucky we were that he was alive though the impact of the ball left a dent in his skull forever and there was internal bleeding.

My belief then was if some one is sick, they go to hospital, they get better and they go home. So I was not worried much. Hari and I skipped school as many days as he was in the hospital, received well wishers and friends to the hospital room in all the glory of sister and brother of the patient, received bags full of fruits very humbly to be divided and devoured by both of us as soon as they left! I do not remember offering a piece of fruit to my other brother who was sleeping and waking at random intervals.

May be children with their strong beliefs and happy thoughts make miracles happen unknowingly.

Lets run and lets not

Running away is so exciting,
from problems, from people
and from the self from time to time,

The adrenalin rush of panic
and fear of being caught unguarded
for some,
of elaborately woven rationalisations for some,
makes the act a lofty mission

Theory scares some, action scares some,
silence scares some, speech scares some,
morning scares some, night scares some,
love scares some, indifference scares some,

Invisible hierarchies cleverly
conditioned by the socialisation process
leaves each craving for a pat on the back
from the highest order and a notion
that the point representing pinnacle
is perfection

we are the perfect points and
we are the lowest rungs,

I am you and you are me
And we are a dialectical whole
in the twilight of opposites

Alice needs to get out of the wonderland

I remember crying in the lab for a day and then coaxed by the flower woman to examine what is happening to me and what are my authority issues and went through a moment of eureka! I found it. I thought realisation of our pattern itself is enough to change it. But as the saying goes, a good beginning is half the work done, I only began that day and I am yet to finish working on the rest.

Being the fourth and last child has its own advantages and disadvantages. Since advantages become disadvantages some times I feel its a mixed bag of mints of different flavour. If I am lucky I will get rose flavoured mint or a mango flavoured one if not it might be garlic or dog shit or horse breath.

I am a pampered one and I am loved by my family and in no way I am hinting at a traumatic dramatic incident or any such thing.

What happens is when I am with my siblings, I take or am given the position of a child while he/she will be the adult. This does not happen by a conscious design. May be I push them as well to be the adults and put myself as a child.

So I end up either meekly agreeing or rebelling in my own ways. This is a lose lose situation. My rebellion is also honed to hurt the Achilles heel of each one of them. Who does this unless they are child like?

Because of this, I kept score and whined constantly in front of my partner and the constant sentences were 'nobody asks me how am I or nobody is interested in my life or no one asks for my opinion, do they know me at all?'

I need my brothers and sister to acknowledge me, approve of me and pat me on my back and be proud of me. Isn’t this very childish?

I have experienced equal footing with all of them at one or the other time. Much more with one at particular times. And I know none of this is intentional.

I need my inner child which is forever banished from going up stairs to be with the adult siblings to grow up. May be writing this helps the child to climb the ladder and see the forbidden kingdom and then jump ahead to adulthood.

Otherwise the horcrux of my childhood anguish would forever be alive.

Coming of age

I know my hair is soft and silky, the colour is pitch black and lustrous. I know how much effort I put in making it that way. Paste of methi seeds one day, steaming the roots and hot towel treatment another day, oiling and massaging with camphor and neem leaf smoked coconut oil and what not.

I know men look at me when I go out and they know that I know that. With anticipation of the world applauding and falling to my feet, I go out feigning nonchalance, tossing my hair and with wide open ears.

I sing in the bathroom passionately and wish that a music director walking in the street suddenly discovers the haunting melody coming from an untapped original voice and eureka!

I secretly hope that people think that I am beautiful. When I look in the mirror I see that I am beautiful to myself but what do others think? I curse my pug nose at one time because it makes my face round like a circle at other times I think it is fashionable to have a distinct nose.

I get lost in fantasies listening to music. Aamir Khan comes to Mysore and is riveted on the spot when he sees me. (Ponds dreamflower talc ad!). He does not have any other go but to follow me and bawl at my feet. Wow too much. What will I tell mom when that happens? I still need to study and I am only 16! will he wait till I am older?

I write poems and I become famous because the writers discover the uncanny talent I have. I am the talk of the town. All I need to do is write and send it to publications.

I see a boy following me wherever I go. He is my neighbour. I teach English and Kannada to his young nieces along with my siblings. I give him a glance once in a while. His niece drops a letter in my lap one day. He is begging for my love, he is ready to face the world, he is ready to convince my parents, he is ready to wait, he is ready to take on anything.. all I have to do is say YES.

Ooohoooo, this is becoming way too serious mannn!! I dont need letters, you can follow me all you want but nothing further ok? Dont you get it? I do not see you like that at all and I have no intentions of marrying till another decade and a half and that too not to you by the way!

I share all the above haughtily. Whew thats that. I have cleared the matter. No misunderstandings. Nobody knows at home. My reputation is unscathed. Hurray!

I wake up to commotion of loud weeping voices, loud abuse in the street.. what else do you expect when you are living in such uncouth surroundings?

Wait, the abuse is aimed at me and my family, the wailing is because somebody died! The people thronging in the street are to find out what I will say to this!
HOLY CRAP what did I do? I brought disgrace to myself and to my family. I pushed someone to commit suicide. I am a vamp and the world hates me. People will throw stones at me and my mother will die because of the shame!

Should I commit suicide as well? But how to die? Where to buy poison or rope? God will it hurt?

Brothers are walking around chuckling, mother is weeping and angry and sister is chuckling and angry from time to time.

Ok when to die? How to die?

Naanna asked me to go with him on a walk. I went with him. Does he want to banish me from home? Will he leave me in the street and ask me to get lost?

So far my interactions with him were about demanding money for various things, joking around and getting tutored by him to do simple & compound interest problems for SSLC exam!

We go to the nearby stadium and sit. He is looking some where and telling me, “this area is not suitable for young girls like you, I am planning to shift the house immediately to a far away area, we will do this within 15 days, till then you stay with your sister in her hostel at Hassan, we will shift and fetch you from there, this area is full of people who do not have class”.

He held my hand while coming back. Am I his little girl again? I am given another chance to life? I will be so damn good this time, he will be proud of me.

Siblings can chuckle away and mother can weep but Naanna is going to make everything al right for me.
I will never go out of the house even unless required. I am going to be the most penitent dutiful daughter. Aamir Khan can wait …....

P.s: The guy did not die, he took sleeping pills and faked his own suicide. What a classless ass! But, thank heavens I will not go to jail!

Authority - the perceptions and confusions around it ...

I keep having trouble with this one. Many times I feel that I am not exercising enough of it and am being a push over. But, the image I make is of a person who is bringing the authority in. This is a tricky business and I need new insights into myself, my leadership style and when things become participatory across the board and when it is My call alone. Where does the buck stop?

A boy and a girl and a new dynasty …

The girl was 8 and the boy was 10 (give a year here or there). Till that night, their major preoccupation in life was skipping hours together mastering all the levels and getting educated from older brother who taught them capital cities of all nations, Latin numbers (alpha, beta, gamma, delta ending with kappa and lambda) etc. and all the ‘stuff’ one needs to know. They new names like Eurasia, Oceania, Middle East and Far East because of him.

That particular night, they were sitting on the cot and the boy was showing off his prowess in jumping tricks and the girl was in awe of the rubber limbs of the boy who was contorting his body parts like a circus monkey. Suddenly there was a great ‘THUD’ and a breathless yelp and great eerie silence.

They both knew what it was and rushed out of the house. Their guess turned out to be true. That was the cruellest thing they had witnessed in their experience of a decade.

The boy always wanted a puppy and she wanted whatever the boy wanted because she knew it must be good if he wants it. Because he was the one who protected her from ‘real’ danger. He told her when they were crossing the road to School to hold his hand, he was the one who beat up the pesky boy who taunted them, he was the one who made her believe that ‘Hanumantha’ is always with them, he was the one who held her hand in the night when she was afraid of ‘Vajramuni’ coming and piercing her stomach, he was the one with real strategies to escape if there was a cattle stampede, elephant attack or an earthquake….

Their home was a smallish building which was in the fashion of a train. 5 different sized living spaces one after the other. There were six people living altogether with lots of stuff since the father was a hoarder of old stuff.
That eventful night, the boy and girl rushed out to find the puppy which they had looked at with longing, in the drainage ditch. That puppy had wandered off from the locality of its birth and was ‘claimed’ by a pesky boy who got to keep it just because he was younger and peskier. It was rightfully the boy’s and the girl’s. Pesky boy’s grandmother knew it and she kicked the puppy forcefully and evicted it out of her premises.

The boy and the girl faced one insurmountable barrier – PARENTS. The boy showed his potential to be a great negotiator by tearfully pleading and agreeing left, right and center for whatever adverse effects parents put forward and the girl told the ultimate solution, she would go with two meals everyday and the third meal can be given to the puppy. There was agreement after lots of haggling over the price the boy and girl will pay.
• No dog poo or pee in the house
• They will be responsible for dog walks
• They will make sure it is clean and will never enter THE kitchen
• It shall not be a nuisance when it grows up and should stay out of the house

Counter considerations were put up by the boy and girl team,
• There will not be any poo or pee but just in case it happened then they will only clean it up,
• They want the puppy to be inside the house now because it is winter and it is cruel to leave it out but it will go out once it grows
The puppy which looked like a starved pirate came in to their home that night. It was the founder member of the ‘Chinnu’ dynasty. It ruled the roost from that moment on.
This dynasty was founded by the boy and girl.

Naanna will always be my Naanna

So many things happened between my last post and now. I lost my Naanna ....
I dont want to write anecdotes about him and I dont want him to become a story ..
I miss the smell of snuff on Chinnu's ears when I kiss it ...
I miss the rough stubbly cheek I kissed often ...