Richa
Jha
It is difficult
being a husband in today's world. Can't say if it has always
been like this, but this age has sure seen some gross injustices
being heaped upon us unsuspecting men.
Look at
me, I am a perfectly normal, benign, well-meaning, thinking
man with all my senses intact. I have feelings too. But when
with The Wifey, my independent existence becomes redundant,
even non-existent. In my younger days, I thought I was well
qualified to take on any nature of challenge in life. But women,
especially married women, defy all norms of sanity. So nothing
had prepared me for dealing with The Wifey. These days I feel
I am, what do I say- forever trapped. For instance, I am made
to say yes to her awkward questions ("does this beige look
good here?") when every cell in my body is revolting to
say a no; but when I think she wants to hear a yes, she actually
wants me to say a no. I can see several heads nod in agreement
with me. Yes dear friends, they are all the same. You know one
woman, you've known them all. A trickier situation to get trapped
into is when she is in an evaluative mood. "Does this pink
go well with these pants or this fuchsia?" How am I supposed
to know. I can't even spell fuchsia right. I bet even she can't.
As far as I know, they both look the same to me, and if my honest
opinion really counted, I would have said they both made her
look like Cindy Lauper. My situation is worse than those dumb
crash test dummies. At least they don't feel the pain. Here,
do what I will, I am bound to get hammered.
I met a
friend from college the other day and we sat up late into the
night sharing our woes. Not like the 'job sucks and the world's
coming to an end' kind of woes, but a more soul searching, intensely
private kind of heart-to-heart. We spoke about women (isn't
that what we men do all the time, anyway?), not any woman in
general the way we used to in college, but his, and mine in
particular. We talked about what these two women had made of
us. Is this what we'd set out to do when we were much younger?
We talked into the night, some moment, with wine, at others,
without. We felt like buddies, bonded all over again. Both of
us mentally weather-beaten, wife-beaten men drinking away our
blues. It was cathartic, I tell you.
The closest
I got to this feeling of catharsis was when, as a boy aged 17,
I had poured open my heart before our hostel warden's daughter
(oh, the warden's short haired daughter) that day on the steps
of our school canteen under the open clear skies which suddenly
wept aloud and applauded all at once at my innocent confessions.
She wanted to rush in because of the sudden drizzle, but I knew
it was heaven's way of giving me a thumbs-up. I told her how
much I loved seeing her get under the skin of Eliza's character
when she played Pygmalion on stage that morning. It took guts
to open my mouth, but when I finally did, with each phoneme
that came out of me, I felt my tense nerves easing up, my reeling
head settling in, my throbbing temples beginning to slip into
oblivion, my sweaty palms drying up, my dry lips feeling moist
again, the jamboree of black holes in front of my eyes dispersing,
and my brain starting to function again. I suddenly remembered
my name, and after several hours since I'd first seen her on
stage that morning, I started to exist again. You see, that
is the power of catharsis.
But this
tête-à-tête I had with my college buddy happened
under different circumstances. Both The Wifey and my friend's
wife having gone home on longish vacations, we two are under
forced bachelorhood. Let the Wifey fume and explode when she
gets to know this, but I AM LOVING IT! I don't care if you tattle
before her, but I will say it a hundred times. I am loving being
on my own, and being a master of my own likes and dislikes.
I don't care whether I am wearing dirty clothes or clean ones.
I'm enjoying having two cups of coffee just before hitting the
bed, and not being made to brush my teeth before turning in
for the night. I like being able to sleep on the same bedcover
that's been unchanged for so many days, and sleeping on her
'dear cushions'. I have never understood this concept of having
multi-layered coverings and then separate cushions during the
day, and pillows for the night. Other than the shape, they look
the same to me. I like jumping in bed without clean feet, and
being able to read deep into the night without once hearing
the unending cribs from her screaming to turn off the lights.
Aah ha! What she'll never know is that my bed lamp doesn't get
switched off through the night- not unless one of you decides
to sneak it to her. Hey Wifey, wherever you are, just know it
that I am enjoying this freedom.
For once,
I get to lie down on the sofa and watch TV. Ha ha! I even dangle
my legs from the arms, this way, you see? I can channel surf
and snore at the same time, I can have my soup while lounging
in the living room, I can, wow,…whoopee! For once, I am the
master of my own life, and I'm loving it!
