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Does domesticity kill the writer in you? Or is it just a question of taking it for granted and letting it fade away?
When my spouse walked into the room, I was staring at a blank word doc. Blank, except for the title above. Wordlessly (pun intended), I swiveled my laptop around to face him and saw his expression change. “Maybe I should type –I rest my case. The End—,”I said, amused at the irony, but his sad, apologetic face made me assure him this was entirely expected.
When women in India think of life after marriage, I am told they hazard guesses about unknowns. Some know how their days will likely look, while others have only opinions and advice to go by. I am one who had a better idea than most. And amidst my certainty about who would cook breakfast (him) and who would organize the closets (me), there was a core of solid fact that I saw coming from a mile away. My tendency to grab a passing thought, sit it down and have a wordy heart-to-heart, and watch it proliferate on e-paper, would, in all likelihood, come to a shuddering halt.Whenever I want to toy with the words ‘compulsion’ and ‘compulsory’, writing is my default metaphor. I wrote because I could. No, make that had to. It brought me clarity, and later, joy. An audience, especially in my early years, was an unnecessary nuisance, and many childish phrases ended crackling and contorted at the bottom of a bin, to be fished out by Mum when I wasn’t looking. In later life, I’d wistfully watch as an idea pirouetted tantalizingly close, and I chose to let it slip away.
At other times, and especially because they all come to life in the dead of night, I’d pace in the privacy of my room, as something amorphous brewed and took shape. Yanking my laptop open, I’d tether it to a page, ruthlessly pruning until I was satisfied with the end product. Space and quiet and a great big churning were the key ingredients in that temperamental mix, and cohabitation—and consequently domesticity—threw a giant spanner in those already-delicate works.
I say this in the firmest way possible—this is not an excuse or a blame-game. And it should never be either. I merely observe this phenomenon like I would a passing train, aware but not necessarily internalizing. I alone am responsible for my actions and this is clearly a path I choose to take at some level.
There are just the two of us at home, we have the luxury of being in separate rooms if we so choose, no demands are made on my time and attention, other than those I make on myself, and when I look at all these women, spouses, homemakers and mothers, who churn out entire books, I can only shake my head at myself and say “You silly, spoilt girl.”
Do I want to put out a book? No. We’ll save my views on publishing for another day.
Do I want to make a career out of writing? Not right now, though how tempting that sounds for the future.
I am content to sketch little stories—a paragraph here, a tale there, a sweet chunk of poetry—just supports that keep me creatively happy as I go about my life and my work. A few years ago, this dissonance between the buzz in my head and the silence on paper would not have bothered me so, but now the din grows insistent. The drums beat, the voices taunt, do-it-do-it-do-it, and a curious sense of time passing by tugs at my feet like a strong undercurrent.
I won’t make the Pulitzer. I don’t endeavor to be the Bard. But somewhere in me, coiled at the base of a place I fear to visit, lies an unfamiliar feeling of justice denied. Maybe domesticity didn’t kill my mojo after all. I took it for granted and watched it shrivel and now don’t know what to do with the dry, coarse entrails.
Pic credit: Claire Boynton (Used under a Creative Commons license)
Dilnavaz Bamboat's heart occupies prime South Mumbai real estate. The rest of her lives in Silicon Valley, California, where she hikes, reads, hugs redwood trees and raises a pint-sized feminist. She is the read more...
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Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Women today don’t want to be in a partnership that complicates their lives further. They need an equal partner with whom they can figure out life as a team, playing by each other’s strengths.
We all are familiar with that one annoying aunty who is more interested in our marital status than in the dessert counter at a wedding. But these aunties have somehow become obsolete now. Now they are replaced by men we have in our lives. Friends, family, and even work colleagues. It’s the men who are worried about why we are not saying yes to one among their clans. What is wrong with us? Aren’t we scared of dying alone? Like them?
A recent interaction with a guy friend of mine turned sour when he lectured me about how I would regret not getting married at the right time. He lectured that every event in our lives needs to be completed within a certain timeframe set by society else we are doomed. I wasn’t angry. I was just disappointed to realize that annoying aunties are rapidly doubling in our society. And they don’t just appear at weddings or family functions anymore. They are everywhere. They are the real pandemic.
Let’s examine this a little closer.
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