Grow old with me in a cynical cruel world

I am a year older now.  Living my last year of the 30s. I often wonder if growing old is just about grey hair and sleeping early or is it just the way one looks at and reacts to life .

I do not attach much importance to brands . In a way, I look at people in the same vein. I have no space or time for people who are just badge value and are hollow beyond that.

I live in a cloistered world. It scares me to think of the women who fight for their lives everyday. While the entire country is still shocked, confused, angry over the brutal rape of a woman last year, I read today on twitter about a lady who does not have money to even  drink a glass of milk as the mother in law controls her drinking habits. In other words,  she controls the household budget and therefore the amount of milk every member of the family is entitled to

In another family, in laws want their daughter in law to quit her job, while some want their daughters in law to work and contribute to family income. Why is it that we women have no decision making power in our own homes ? We are controlled by family and society at every phase of our lives. We are told how to dress, when to step out of the house, whether to work or not and what to do with our lives.And worse, we let them do it, because that is what becomes a "good " girl.

Our abilities are scrutinized , our looks are criticized, our careers are shortened, our lives are compromised. We are judged all the time - by what we say and do and by what we dont say and do. If we question , we are rebels and are identified as elements not to be emulated. And a lot of women are conditioned to accept this as it is written so in their code of conduct to be a good daughter and a good daughter in law.

My father taught me years ago to not suffer fools. I fight my own battles. But today, I am very scared as I think about the battle the girl fought and lost inside a bus. She paid not just with her life, but died in agony and humiliation. And it is a pity that one of her murderers will walk free because of a statistic..he is underage. Does that give him a right to kill someone ? To violate and inflict violence on someone ?

I have lost faith in our country to some extent - in our leaders and protectors. Above all, in people who gossiped and refused to help those young battered people who lay naked and bleeding in the bush after being assaulted. It could have been me. Is it a crime that I choose public transport over private transport ? Or should I just abide by these codes of conduct and say a grateful prayer everyday , thanking God for keeping me safe ?

I enter this year very insecure . I am very very afraid not just for me, but for a whole lot of us women who wake up and walk into the world confident, ready to face the day and hope to return home safely.. A routine habit that we take so much for granted..ironically may not be so anymore..

Or maybe there is hope somewhere..or did I hear that Hope is a dangerous thing ?

A birthday just went by..

I turned a year older today ..well, it neither made front page news, nor was I thronged with bouquets and brickbats.I was simply overwhelmed by the wishes from various people - virtual and real, ex bosses and ex colleagues, travellers and bloggers, family and friends , classmates I had not seen for many years and people I had known for less than a year..

My maid looked at me at 12 pm and asked me - " Madam, how come you are looking so fresh ? " She is so used to seeing me in my bed clothes that she probably must have wondered if it was a new year resolution to wake up early and have a bath..I muttered something about a birthday and she was all excited demanding for a cake and rushing to the balcony and returning with a small pink flower..I was touched and promptly ordered for cakes for her children..Nevertheless, I wondered about all the good people out there who took time to wish me by phone and the internet.

I also realized that I had reached an age when my mother had my brother . I was a gawky teenager then and was excited at the prospect of a young baby at home.Today I dont have kids, but somehow that thought doesnt affect me. I also thought about my mother who was in a different generation, learning to cope with a teenager like me and a baby boy at home. We were in transition then. We had just moved from a joint family to an individual home, but that hardly made a difference in retrospect. It simply meant that we could eat my mother's cooking instead of the old cook's saltless food . It also meant that my mother did not have to rush and ensure a cup of curds is kept aside for me, much to the chagrin of her inlaws. It also meant that she didnt have to "help" the cook who was my grandmother's buddy as a dutiful daughter in law and we could eat an extra chapathi or a serving of rice without asking for permission.

We were still living in individual houses in Madras , in a large compound - under the watchful eye of my late grandfather, the family patriarch who controlled among many things our freedom. My mother was gently balancing the politics of a joint family and her own disappointments at not being able to fulfil her music career . Her life was not just ruled by us and her inlaws, but my grand aunts and uncles and their many many children . She managed us- my father's slowly failing health and my brother , who was just a baby and me, a growing rebel. We were so preoccupied by our lives that I hardly remember her falling sick or talking about her insecurities.

Somewhere in her life was me, a growing rebel, whom she had groomed to be a first ranker in academics , but who was learning to look at life beyond books. I was learning to discover my own emotions and form opinions of people. I was vulnerable, but a rebel alright. I rejected everything and refused to conform. I wanted independence and loads of it. We had no phones then and needed our grandfather's permission to use the main line at home. My mother used to take me on long bus rides to see her parents, very often being denied the car at home which would have gone to pick up one of my uncles or drop my cousin at school. If she complained, I didnt pay attention then.

Initially there were just two houses in a compound. Then two became three and later four. I grew up with cousins and I enjoyed my childhood a lot, but I somehow could not deal with the barrage of second cousins and their parents and grandparents who constantly landed in our lives.We were always thronged by relatives who came to see my grandparents. If a relative died or a baby was born to some distant cousin, our grandparent's house was the nucleus of activity. Probably today, we are starved of relatives and festivities, but then those days, I was waiting to throw a bomb at them. They literally invaded our lives. We had no concept of privacy or freedom. Even worse, such concepts didnt exist. My mother hardly complained.

Today I dont have the mental strength or the patience of my mother. I dont have the ability to balance and juggle life. I constantly have emotional upheavals , work tensions and health issues. I dont have the health or the ability to even pick up my health like the way she did. I have all the independence in the world. I dont have people invading my life and I can choose to bathe at 12 or at 3 or not bathe at all - I still remember being told then when to wash our hair and how many times a day as well.Today, she has got the freedom that i craved for, but she is at an age when she needs a support system. The relatives have all walked away into oblivion and she still manages her life, my dad's ill health, my brother's and mine highs and lows. Today she complains a bit. I hear, but I can do nothing much ..

Bombay ki Hawa 6

I remember the first time I experienced a sense of high. It was on my 22nd birthday and I had just had my first drink .And my companions were two new found friends I had met in a flight three months ago.

I remember that evening so well. I left hostel around 5 pm , walked up to Mahalakshmi temple and watched the waves for a long time. Long after the Aarti was over, I let the wave of loneliness overpower me. I wanted to spend some moments with people I could call friends.

I had been in Bombay for over 6 months and yet in that large metropolis barring a few classmates, I had no close friends. The only ones I could relate to were two men I had met a couple of months ago.

I had met A&S on the flight from Madras, hitched a ride with them and then lost touch with them . But a month later, the blackboard near the hostel phone announced that I had missed a call from A . I was excited and irritated - I hadnt taken his number and he has called back after a month and not left a number either. But common sense told me that if he had called once, he will call again. So I waited and the call came.

We three became good friends later on - well, if friendship meant enjoying each other's company, having a comfort factor, cracking up a bit here and there and not getting into personal lives ,then we were all friends then . And so, on my 22nd birthday, I reached out to the pay phone and asked my only friends to come over for a coffee to Marine Drive.

It didnt take them long to figure out and we realized that we were all January born and were Capricornians, except for A who was a cusp. And it was his brilliant idea that we celebrate and lo we were in Marine Drive having a beer each. The conversations poured in and so did the beer. I started protesting but A& S would have none of it. The Cindrella hour for the hostel was getting closer, and A poured more beer into my mug. Soon the tensions eased as I let my loneliness be lost amidst the laughter.

It was a new high. My first drink and I was out in a new city celebrating my birthday being treated by two men who were virtually strangers .The taste of beer mingled with the new found freedom, as I was enjoying the company of two people who until a couple of months ago I had not even met. And yet, in that strange bond that we were building without our own knowledge, a 22 year old was born . I felt light, my head began to swim and the reflexes relaxed. It was probably amidst all the dizzying effect of the spirit, I experienced a momentary moment of loneliness being quelled by unknown love and yet , at that moment all that I was probably thinking of was Sister Rosa and the witching hour.

A's wicked grin at seeing me high and talking gibberish still remains with me as I write this piece today. They told me later they were amused at my panic for I was apparently very high . A kept recounting later that I tripped, but I dont believe him. S was always the nice guy . He kept reassuring me as he flagged a cab and helped me into it. A deliberately took his time, munching the sandwiches, enjoying the last sip while I was half mad at him, almost in the midst of throwing the cutlery at him .I felt giddy as the cab left and drifted off to sleep for some brief moments while cursing them for getting me high . But somewhere in that sleep, I found a sense of what one would describe as happiness.

I did return late to the hostel all flushed and high as the taxi raced from marine drive to breach candy . My friends later say that when sister Rosa opened the door, I looked at her and said "The bus crashed." A cake was cut later at midnight , but all I remembered were the cheers from the evening !

Many birthdays have come and gone and I have been high on life as always, but A & S - I wonder where they are ! Well, I did manage to trace S, but A ...