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Friend-Zoning the Husband!

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My hubby and I have been friends for as long as I can remember: 2 years of being best buds, 5 years of seeing each other and 13 years of marriage. When you’ve been friends before being romantically involved, there isn’t much that you shy away from saying to each other. Everything that comes to the mind, just slips off the tongue in your spouse’s presence: the good, the bad and the ugly.

I see couple friends of mine who are so sweet to each other. They always address each other as “aap” (the respectful second person pronoun) when speaking in Hindi, the wives don’t cut their hair short because their husbands won’t like it, listen to their hubby’s opinions when shopping for dresses, assemble tacos for them when at a DIY food counter at a party (many times out of choice of wanting to pamper their hubbies rather than out of some patriarchal expectation on the husband’s part). It’s all very adorable, and yet, so alien to me!

My hubby has often picked up my phone call, absorbed in his work, affectionately addressing me as “Ch*tiya!” before launching into a conversation and breaking off half- way, realizing that I’m not one of the boys! I’m his girl! And we have laughed, while he muttered an apology in between! That’s our relationship! We’ve been friends so long that curse words are more appropriate, loving nicknames than addressing each other as “aap”. Between us, there’s no semi-respectful “tum” either- just a no-nonsense “tu” like “Eh-tu!” (the most casual second person pronoun).

As friends, you ask people for their opinions but eventually do what you think best. I think I still have a hard time understanding how my hair or my dressing affects his life in any way, so I have cut my hair short a million times knowing that he loves my hair long (like every other Indian man’s obsession with “lambe, ghané baal”*) and I wear what I like. And he’s the same. How many ever times I tell him that I wish he dressed more soberly: nice, classic cuts and good fabrics; he still dresses in his Nandy-style, wearing bright colours and funky pants with such aplomb that he could give any Bollywood hero a run for his money. Maybe he needs to live out the opposite of his daily life on a holiday, giving up the serious corporate look for a fultoo filmy ishtyle!

That’s what happens when someone has been your friend first: you listen but you don’t have to follow. You can take Nandy and me out of the ‘friend zone’ but you can never take the friendship out of us!

I see one of my closest friend cutely making paani puri for her husband. She jabs the puri, filling it and placing it in his mouth. They’re like a couple out of a fairy tale! She doesn’t do it with any preconceived notions of her duty as a wife. She does it because she loves babying him and he babies her too. He’s chivalrous with her: picking up her bags without a groan when they travel, always walking behind her into elevators and crowded nightclubs.

And then there’s me: friend-zoned for life (voluntarily so). I’d much rather smash a pani puri onto Nandy’s face and start a food fight than put it in his mouth. And he’s the same. He never treats me like a lady: always walks into the elevator before me, and never looks to see if I’m ok walking in a short dress and heels through the dodgy lanes of Colaba at 1 am while he scoots in front of me, heading to where our car is parked. Why didn’t he get the car and pick me up at the door of the nightclub? Laughter can be my only response to that question because friends don’t do that.

When we travel, we’re very clear: his bag is his problem and my bag is my burden. He still tries to complain about the twelve pairs of shoes I’m carrying and the many outfits but eventually he knows- it’s mine to lug around! He isn’t going to be throwing his jacket on any puddles to prevent me from getting my feet (or in this case, hands) dirty.

So I sit here, wondering how is it possible that there are still a few things that we are unable to share? Despite the unabashed honesty that we have, there are some words, even in a friendship, that are forbidden.

For us, it’s the obvious! We can make jokes about everything as long as we don’t touch the other’s Achilles’ heel (or scalp, in Nandy’s case). Like for months, his hair-stylist has been suggesting a hair transplant but he doesn’t want to do it. Every time he discuses it, I want to scream and say, “Do it! Do it!” He says, “I should learn to age gracefully and not resort to these shenanigans”, but all I want to do is shake him up and say, “Why age gracefully when science allows you an attempt at reversing it?”, but I can’t say that. I have to show solidarity towards his vanishing hairline, which hurts him as much as me. I nod in agreement and say, “Yes. Must. Age. Gracefully.”

And he doesn’t say what he has been dying to, since the day BabyA was born. I lost all the weight (and more) simply from breastfeeding, and then ballooned into an even bigger blimp because of my sheer love of food. As he saw my transformation, he probably wanted to scream, “Fatty- stop eating that damn brownie, while telling me you don’t have the time to work out because life is so hard after a baby!” but he didn’t. He probably bit his tongue and kept mum. Just like most dads should around heavy, new mums.

Now you’re left wondering that how have I uttered the forbidden words on such a public forum, when I wasn’t supposed to let him have a whiff of what I was really feeling? In reality, my public blog tends to be the most private space to pen down anti-husband venting, since my husband never reads my blog! Maybe if he played the role of the supportive spouse, he would follow every post, but he doesn’t! He’s my friend first, and after all, “har ek friend kameena hota hai!”**

* long, thick, black hair
** Every friend is a rogue! (A popular song from a Bollywood movie called Chashme Baddoor)

Over-ripe ovaries & Pappu ka Andaa: My Infertility Saga

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I was brought up to believe that I came from a lineage of extremely fertile women. Somewhere I thought that my only problem in life would be to make sure I didn’t pop out more munchkins than I could juggle at once.

5 years into my marriage, I started planning. I announced it to the world, suffering from a disease called being “overly honest”, whenever anyone would inquire (and in India, everyone inquires!) Obviously, the time bomb started ticking, more loudly in my head than in anyone else’s.

After two years of no luck, my gynaec gave up and asked me to get our tests done. Both our tests came out fine. I felt so depressed as I spoke to friends, hearing one line repeatedly: “We conceived on our first try! We were so surprised!” I wanted to stuff a sock in some of their mouths because I clearly remember their baby planning time frame being much longer. Maybe every woman needs to view herself as a Fertility Goddess due to some innate psychological need to feel good.

Then started the long ordeal of scientific intervention. I went through a total of 9 IUIs (non-assisted and assisted) but to no avail. Every time I saw women with babies, I felt like a failure. Despite all the fancy degrees I had accumulated, I could not even do the most natural thing any illiterate woman could do! I flinched during poojas, when people sang “Jai Ganesh” when the part “Baanjan ko putra deth”* would come. It didn’t disgust me for the same reasons as before (being a feminist, I can’t stand this Indian obsession with sons) but also because I felt like everyone singing was talking about me- pitying me! Let’s just say this was my melodramatic, Bollywood avatar!

I remember when a very close pregnant friend, who knew about my struggle, proceeded to take me for all of her baby shopping. It’s amazing how intimidating little baby clothes with furry bears smiling up at you can seem when you’re in that situation. I remember running into the changing room, on some ridiculous pretext, and crying.

Finally, I gave up on the less invasive IUIs and went in for an IVF procedure. The days at the infertility clinic were interesting, to say the least, sitting in the waiting room with so many aspiring girls. As the days in each fertility cycle would progress, we would compare notes. We would discuss how many eggs we had produced this month, and how good the quality was, according to the doctor. Over many such conversations, I started realizing that I was the “Pappu” of the class- always last! You remember Dairy Milk’s ad where Amitabh Bachchan is elated when a balding Pappu finally passes his 12th standard exams, and BigB sings in shock, “Pappu pass ho gaya”? I was that Pappu- the big fat andaa** who couldn’t produce good andaas! I had the least eggs, and even if I managed a satisfactory basket, the quality was not up to the mark. My eggs were stamped as factory rejects, and the doc labelled my ovaries “that of a 40 year old!” (when I was 30).

My in-laws and husband had always convinced me to stop all treatments, explaining to me, that we were fine as we were. My parents never pressurized me but felt like I should at least give science a chance.

After 2 unsuccessful IVFs, I was ready to give up! I had had enough. The injections were probably the worst part of the treatment because when you have to take one every day, even the doctor administering it no longer sympathizes with you. You feel like a cow on a dairy factory line up, being inhumanely poked with hormonal injections and then they’re onto the next cow waiting in line. I even started resembling a cow! The mood fluctuations were bugging! I was DONE: I had accepted that Pappu hadn’t passed but perhaps he had come to realize that he wasn’t academic after all. Maybe he could be a professional mechanic instead, or something like that?

I spent 6 months feeling depressed and wondering how Nandy and I could ever be complete without a child. Then I had my first little miracle. My sister told me that she had discussed it with my brother-in-law and they were willing to have a child (theirs) and give it to me. I didn’t even know what to say. I knew I didn’t want her to do that, but the fact that she was willing to, was the biggest gift that anyone could give me. That was a game changer.

After this incident, I started to feel some peace because I finally understood that I had been holding onto one thing for so long that I had neglected appreciating all the blessings God had showered upon me. I didn’t want to have a “sour grapes” mentality but I definitely needed to appreciate the positive in my life: that I could travel as often as I wished, that I didn’t have to share my husband with anyone (Nandy-obsessed me!), that there was less noise in my life, and that no one was wiping their snotty nose on my “dry clean only” dress every time I got ready. Let’s just say- I pulled myself out of the “have-nots” and started focussing on what I had: I started loving the silence… and my space!

There was also a spiritual realization that occurred. I had studied at a Convent school, and we often sang the hymn “I surrender all”. My father-in-law explained to me that when Vaishnavs say “Shri Krishna sharnam mamah”, it means the same thing: “Krishna, I take shelter within you. Do with me as you think best.” I surrendered all to God: trusting that he had better plans for me, I was stress-free!

6 months later, as I packed for my room-mate’s wedding in Santorini, I sensed I might be pregnant. I told my husband that maybe we should cancel the trip but he dismissed it, saying that was impossible because if all the treatment hadn’t worked, how could we suddenly be pregnant naturally? I got on the flight, and spent my entire trip in a daze of severe nausea and exhaustion! To the extent, that till now, just mentioning Greece or waving a gyro in my face, is the best way to see me double over in nausea. 5 days into the holiday, when I peed on the stick, I wasn’t surprised that it came up positive. It had finally happened and I was happy but I can’t say I was ecstatic. I had truly surrendered everything to God and whatever (S)He had chosen for me, I was up for the ride!

Although, I must admit, my spiritual serenity left me the moment I came back and rushed to get a sonography. As I saw that little kidney bean on the screen, and heard her heartbeat, my heart soared. I could no longer think “higher” thoughts. My mind was fluff and the only jingle that kept going through my mind was Amitabh’s voice singing to me, “Pappu pass ho gaya!”***

 
* Bless all infertile women with sons.
** Andaa literally means egg but is also used colloquially to mean zero.
***Pappu Pass Ho Gaya (Pappu has passed his exam!) ad link http://youtu.be/HIpnpO00Ohs

My Daughter: My Unlikely Fairy Godmother

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“Mamma, have you taken your money?”, this 3 year old asks me, making me wonder whether I’m the mother or she is. One thing I have come to understand is that she’s definitely my fairy godmother!

I’ve always been scatterbrained and when I was growing up, I often walked into the lift without wearing any shoes, or as a 20 year old, drove myself all the way to the club to play squash without carrying my racket. This is classic me! And whenever I made panic calls to my mom to tell her I had forgotten my racket, she would instantly go into a tizzy to figure out how it could be delivered to me as quickly as possible. I remember how my parents would laugh as I took the lift back upstairs and walked into the house looking for shoes. They found it so endearing! That’s how parents are… or at least mine are. They loved this eccentricity of mine because, to them, it was adorable!

I got married to a very responsible human being. Nandy grew up with a mom who is very organized and everything in her house is neatly compartmentalized and stored away- to be retrieved instantly, when needed. Her mind is also similar, where there is complete structure to her thoughts, and so nothing gets lost in limbo. She never forgets where she keeps things, she always does things in an orderly fashion and has probably never lost a safety pin in her life. My husband is just like her.

And then there’s me, whose room, cupboards and mind resemble Ground Zero after a nuclear explosion, filled with unnecessary rubble disappearing into abysmal depths. My mind is like a black hole (this problem having been exacerbated after being afflicted with the condition of Mommybrainness), where memories of missed phone calls on my cell and last location of my house keys just vanish into emptiness.

People who are extremely organized don’t think forgetfulness is quirky. They think of it as gross irresponsibility. This is the first lesson I learnt after marriage. I learnt that no one in my new home thought it was cute when I would call for a key-search squad (mostly made up of my kind home staff) to help me every couple of hours, or when I would go out often without carrying any money, and make desperate calls home. I remember being empty tanked, stranded at a petrol pump with no money, when I called my husband, and he only yelled at me, telling me to push the car if I had to: There was no way he was going to send me money. I don’t blame him since he had bailed me out in the past, and felt like there was no learning happening on my part.

Thus, the time when I went all the way to Bandra to cut my hair, only to realise that I was penny-less, I dialed M-O-M-M-Y! And it felt so good to have her pacify me that everything would be ok as she was organizing the money to reach me right away. My father was put on conference, a peon was dispatched in seconds; all the way through, my parents reassuring me that I shouldn’t worry my head about these things. I’m sure in the evening, they shared the anecdote with my grandmom and affectionately chuckled about how I would never change!

I missed that! I missed people forgiving me for my spacey-ness. My husband despised this characteristic of mine! He was right, because pampering had probably encouraged this behavior but taunting wasn’t improving it either. Either way, I missed someone who could sympathize with me and aid me in my key searches. Even the servants now helped only if they could slap me with some insults about my recurring amnesia.

That’s when God gave me BabyA. I may not have gone and hit my head repeatedly, till it bled, against the feet of the local mandir deity like Nirupa Roy, but yet “Bhagwan ne meri sun lee” (God answered my prayers).

BabyA brought about the right balance that I needed in my life. She took the best of both the families: from my husband’s side, she inherited a sense of responsibility and an organized way of working, whereas from mine, she learned softness. That’s why I call her my fairy godmother! From the time that she was little, and could barely talk, she would hand me my keys whenever she saw them lying around, knowing that I was due to lose them soon. After one incident, where I couldn’t buy her a lollipop because I didn’t have cash, she often reminds me before we go out, “Mamma, have you kept your money in the bag?”

She is so responsible that no matter how engrossed she maybe at a restaurant, watching Peppa Pig on her iPad, she will rattle off a checklist of things that we need to gather before we leave, never forgetting even the tiniest of hair clips, and collecting my belongings too, knowing fully well that she can’t trust her nutty mamma with these things. But the best part is that there is no judgement, and never any taunts. She’ll just sit me down, look me in the eye and chuckle fondly, saying, “You’re being a Silly Billy again, Mamma!” And then I get a kiss, smack dab in the middle of my forehead, and I feel like a child. But not an unmindful child… just a loved child: after all, mamma’s need pampering too sometimes!

School is Out: Save our Mommy Souls!

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The holidays: it’s the dreaded time when moms start shivering just thinking about how they are going to occupy their short-attention spanned kids for one and a half to two months. It’s a time as awful as when the baby’s Bai goes for her annual holiday, and if, by any chance, both these events happen to fall simultaneously, then that spells the end of any mommy fun that was planned for the next month (or a few)!

During vacation time, moms spend fleeting free moments by reading blog posts that entice them with words like “10 activities to keep the kids busy during holidays”, or hurriedly signing up at summer camps, wishing that they were prolonged camp-outs, rather than 2 hour classes. You find women furiously typing on their mommy-support what’s app groups, trying to figure out if any other fellow mommy has some magical activity box which would keep them busy for hours (and keep them away from her make-up box, the idiot box (TV) or worse yet, some Pandora’s box that they manage to get their hands on). And this is when the “I-don’t-waste-my-time-in-idle-mommy-chitter-chatter” anti-social mommies are cursing themselves for not building a larger network so as to be able to parcel their kids off to another mom’s house every evening of the week in return for babysitting their monsters for one evening.

Most mothers are only happy about the holidays because it means that they can sleep in, a tad bit (especially if you have a toddler like mine who obediently steps out in the morning to do ‘seva’ of Bhagwanji with dadi or to watch her dad read the paper and slurp tea, while I snooze). Moms also see it as an opportunity to push their lazy husbands to spend some cheese and take the family on a holiday. Although, before and after the holiday (and possibly sometimes during), all they do is pray to the Rain Gods & School Gods, hoping that the former comes soon as it would signal the start of the latter. When I was growing up, 6th June was the date circled in all mommy calendars as the day we expected monsoons in Mumbai and the day when schools would usually reopen.

Now of course, I pity myself, and the other IB* moms the most: For the longest time, I couldn’t fathom why kids (in ICSE and SSC boards) had holidays in the summer but went to school through the monsoons. Why would the Government want the kids to trudge to school at such a mucky time, when traffic ran amok and kids woke up several mornings, got completely dressed, wondering whether they should wade through floods and get to school, only to find out that it was shut or stay at home, and brave getting a demerit for playing truant when “all the other kids made it”.

Now, I understand that we underestimate our Indian Government by disregarding all their decisions as illogical but in reality, they have been very kind to us poor moms! They probably decided upon summer holidays so that kids, during vacation time, could at least be left to their own devices; to run about in building (or area) gardens while their moms put their feet up.

Now with this IB system, the holidays start just as the rains do, which means you’re stuck at home all day with your little terrorist, and there’s no relief as the weather doesn’t allow them to step outside. This is the worst kind of torture that anyone can inflict on moms (worse than “are-we-there-yet” questions on a long road trip). Perhaps this is a conspiracy by the U.S. Government and a way of eventually using American torture techniques to break an entire breed of affluent Indian moms. All I can say is that we fell for it!

I often wondered why my mom would recite her Hanuman Chalisa so animatedly, diving in obeisance over and over again, like she was evoking mercy from someone, nearing the end of our summer holidays. Now I know that she was invoking the Rain Gods so that it would mean that my two siblings and I would soon be off her hands, and her mind, from 8 am to 3:30 pm.

As I venture into the first week of BabyA’s IB school-timed vacations, I find myself doing a Lagaan-style dance, but this time not pleading “kaale megha, kaale megha, paani toh barsao!” (Dark clouds, bring down the rain showers!) It’s my version of a summer dance, my very own Surya Malhar, which begs the Sun God to ascend upon us soon, and clear away the clouds over Bombay city, and over my personal life! I pray, every day, “May the Sun again reinstate my child into school so I may never have to hear ‘Mom, I’m so booooooored’ ever again” (or at least for a year).

Could that be a ray of sunlight that I see at the end of this slushy, mushy rainbow? Oh no! Can’t be! After all, the independence of this country and us, IB mums, is still a month and a half away:

Around the 15th of August, at the stroke of the 8th morning hour, when the world sleeps, IB moms will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes which comes but rarely in history… when the soul of a mother, long suppressed, finds utterance. It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to entertaining our kids, just until August, when we shall finally send  them off to school, and attain our freedom!

Nehru couldn’t have said it better!

Amen!

*IB- International Baccalaureate

“Mamma chahiye!”: Who cut my damn umbilical cord?

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“Mamma chahiye!” (I want my mamma!) she cries, repeatedly. My hubby says, “Go in and comfort her”. My mom in law rushes in since I won’t. She still screams, “Mamma chahiye!” pushing her aside. When I’m saturated with the over-dependency and separation anxiety; when I need a moment to just be on my own and breathe, I land up getting so impatient because of her stickiness, I feel the monster in me rising. What I really want to do is whack her, but I scream so loud, it scares me too.

My sister tells me, “If you get that tired and fed up, just leave her in the room with the maid, and let her keep crying. If you can’t bear to hear her cry, and land up going in but then getting more angry at her, just go for a walk. Let her cry it out but don’t raise your hand at her. It never makes things better. Only worse!”

Even when she’s at school, it’s like a jaap which now just plays continuously in my head, “Mamma chahiye! Mamma chahiye” with lots of sobs! The lady at the gym (an older mom) tells me, “My son was like that. I used to lock the door and pretend I was bathing so I could just sit on my own, but they grow up so fast. He used to kiss my fingertips, every morning as he awoke, and now he won’t even come within a 5 feet radius of me! Enjoy it while it lasts.”

It’s hard to enjoy it most of the time, especially since she wants me to be with her 24×7, holding her hand as she eats, wanting me to play every game, drop and pick her up from school, bathe her, make her sleep.. and the list goes on.

But then my cousin reminds me: “I also get frustrated with my two girls, who want me around for everything but then I think, that’s how we were, so how can we blame them? We were always mamma’s girls and still are”, she laughs. And I have to say: I can’t argue!

Even now, when my mom travels, I miss her miserably. I want her to be constantly accessible to me, irrespective of whether I decide to meet her or stay busy in my own life. Just being in the presence of my mom makes my happiness quotient soar, and if society still allowed me, I would have her hold my hand through every activity too, but patriarchy doesn’t allow me any such blessings.

It’s just that when you grow up, you can’t express your feelings in the same manner. You must behave ‘mature’. When my mom’s about to leave for a trip, I can’t stand at the lift, snotty-nosed, tear-stained cheeks, screaming “Mamma chahiye!” as someone physically restrains me from jumping into the elevator, but that’s what I am really feeling inside. Instead, I put on a happy face and wave good-bye, “Enjoy yourself! Don’t get anything back for us!”

Very often, I hear my hubby telling BabyA, in jest (and a twinge of jealousy), “Why don’t you just go back into your mamma’s tummy?” And I can’t say I’m any different, even at 36! I’d gladly crawl back into my mamma’s womb if science could find a way for a 60 kg human being to carry a 65 kg fetus!

Un’mummi’fied: The Struggle to Look Good

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Before I had BabyA, I lived life in my own school/college-friend-surrounded bubble where I hung out with people I had known all my life, who were like-minded. When I started mother toddler classes, I was introduced to a whole new, shocking world of mommies that I had not expected to stumble on.

I had always imagined that “mommy jeans” were named so because mommies had no time to be fashionable or fit. That’s why they wore high-waisted, ugly jeans that were comfortable and pushed their tummies in as much as something could.

The first day, I went into Music Together class, I walked in looking like the new mommy I was: stringy, sweaty hair, wearing tent-like clothes stained with food and fragranced with vomit (in my defense, both had happened on the way to class) and a 10 month old tucked under my flabby right arm.

What I saw as I walked into class was very different from what I had expected. The SoBo (South Bombay) mommies were nothing like I had imagined. There was a sea (ok- more like a stream) of moms sitting with their 3-4 year olds, looking fit and fabulous, dressed to the tees, gel nails and not a hair out of place. Who were these people? And soon enough, after striking a conversation with some, I found out that not only were they moms but a lot of them were attending class with their younger child. Weren’t moms of 2 supposed to look like something the dog dragged out on a rainy day? The only one who looked bedraggled was me!

I grew up in a house where my parents were very appreciative of the good things we did, and so we grew up being very secure children; perhaps over secure. Thus, I have spent my entire post-married life feeling very confident in my slightly overweight body, as long as I worked out every day (even if I never lost a pound). When I got pregnant, I felt like I had been handed a permit to eat-as-much-as-I-wish and I did, but luckily, I didn’t put on more than 13 kgs and after the baby, breastfeeding felt like BabyA was sucking all the fat out of me, because it left me 5 kgs thinner than my pre-pregnant weight. But then the feeding stopped and the “I-can-outeat-any-man” claims didn’t! My treadmill had turned into a baby clothes’ drying rack and I put on 5 kgs and then another 5! So when I walked into that class, I definitely had problems with my body image.

For the first time in my life, I was an alien in my own body. And seeing all these maternal freaks of nature around me, jiggling their size 4 butts to “She’ll be coming round the mountain when she comes” didn’t help my confidence. But, more importantly, what it taught me was that moms don’t have to be unfit or self-negligent. I learnt that it was ok to prioritize myself sometimes, so that I felt good about myself. At that time, BabyA was still just that: a babe, so I couldn’t muster up too much free time but I went shopping and bought new clothes, because although I didn’t have the time to workout every day, I could at least not regress to my grungy-cool teenager look from college days at Xavier’s (the only SoBo college where the ‘bed-head, crumpled cargos’ look was cool). I invested in a straightener, for which I could spare the two minutes it took to transform me from Maa Kali to Durga Maa. And these little changes transformed my personality also such: into a less volatile and a happier mother.

Now that BabyA is 3 years old, she goes to school and so I get the time to workout and am trying to get back in shape- perhaps not to a size 4, because that was never me, but a shape that I feel happy being (as my husband teases that round is also a shape!)

Now, as I walk in to Music Together, I feel happy in my own skin: hair looks good, clothes smell nice (although they have been subjected to some mommy-dependency pulling by BabyA), a shoulder tote hanging from my better-toned arms (also since A now walks and doesn’t need to be carried around, there’s some space for a handbag), all brought together with a rediscovered air of confidence. I have transformed from an Egyptian mummy (trying to hide behind the bandages that covered up my unkempt appearance due to an unhealthy and unquestioned lifestyle) to a self-assured Mummy.

All I can say is that I have this new generation of moms to thank, for teaching me that it’s ok to slowly start taking out the time to unmummify myself. I know Maa Kali and Durga Maa are both goddesses but I assume, BabyA is a lot less fearful being around the calmer, softer avatar that I look like, and am, now.

Chai and other lies: The Life of a Mumbai Mum

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BabyA comes, handing me the jet spray, and says, “Mamma, why don’t you wash yourself?” Silly me! I really believed that I can steal a minute of peace to sit and answer the call that nature hollers out to me every morning. I wasn’t asking for newspaper time, or even a peek into Facebook to catch up on the important events featuring on my Newsfeed. I just asked for a minute so that I could feel like a human being with some amount of personal and private space so I could empty my bowels without emptying my self-respect. No such luck!

The other day, my nutritionist tells me, “You’re constantly skipping your afternoon green tea!” She doesn’t have kids, so she doesn’t understand that I don’t have the luxury of mulling over life’s ironies as I sip on chai. Does anyone realise what a long and self-reflective process drinking tea is? I never fully understood this till I had a kid (because earlier, time was commonplace- always there): You brew the tea, and then wait for it to cool down, burn your tongue a few times while waiting, and finally slowly sip through it (lavishly slurping if no one’s around) when it reaches the perfect temperature. This takes time, and feels like ‘living on the edge’ when you have a toddler who loves to jump all the time on anything she can find- be it a pillow or more excitingly, your head lying on that pillow.

Some time ago, there was a tea ad campaign that proclaimed “Chai Time is My Time”. Now that I have a toddler, I fully appreciate what that means. It means that drinking (and really enjoying) tea takes time. It is a meditative experience. Moms don’t meditate because moms have no time! “My time”- what’s that? Occasionally, I do encounter this phenomenon but it happens so rarely that it warrants great excitement, wherein I put updates about the hours I slept or movies I watched or I share Instagram images of my “Daffodils” inspired tea cup alongside my fancy Rose Pouchong tea leaves. After all, afternoon tea for a mum is an event and it must be treated as such.

I read blogs, once in a while, wherein people on the outside, wonder what moms in Mumbai (especially SoBo) do. They imagine us to be much like “moms of the Upper East Side” (did you read that article?) who just sit around spending hours on narcissistic activities like getting manicures, exercising and having shopping-mommy-lunches all day, while our kids are brought up by our nannies. I guess some moms live their lives like that (and that’s entirely their choice), but most of the moms I know, don’t. I would love to live that life, but I don’t.

I do take the time out to exercise and take care of my health, especially now that my child is getting older and goes to school, but I don’t understand why do moms have to apologize for prioritizing themselves, or for having a support system? And just because we have a support system, why do some people assume that we are less involved mothers? I have a full time maid for BabyA, and I live in a joint family with a helpful mother in law, and an eager mom who lives 20 minutes away so the world tells me that I must be having lots of “my time” and yet, here I am, trying to schedule a cup of green tea at any point in the day.

It’s not that I don’t have time because I don’t trust anyone with my kid. When I go out, I never call to ask the 3 Ms: my mother in law, mother or maid the quintessential mommy concern, “Baby ne khaana khaaya, kya?” (Has Baby eaten her food?) In fact, I never call home because I’m too busy taking selfies of myself having a good time- because it is an event in my life!

So even though I have so much support, and I do manage to sneak in a mommy lunch every now and then, in reality, I spend most of my day with BabyA. I pick her up from school, and after her lunch, we play board games. We have “chutney time” where we make “chutney” out of each other, hugging tight and squashing tighter till we’re both paté. We go for coffee dates often to the local bookstore, where after our reading session, I drink cappuccinos while she sips on babycinos (milk) at their cafe (she’ll let me drink a hot beverage in peace as long as “coffee time is our time”). I do realize that this is a luxury in itself, because I don’t have to do housework or work outside to supplement the house income, so I can truly spend quality and quantity time with my child. I thank God every day for blessing me with this luxury, but I resent when people make a caricature of my type, and write that we don’t have time for our kids because we have so many people to help out!

I grew up with a mom who was always home when we got home, and to me, that was the biggest joy, whether I expressed it to her or not. I don’t mean to pass judgement on someone who doesn’t have the opportunity to do that, but I do mean to share what was important to me while growing up, and I want to be the kind of mom I have had. That’s why, when people think I have a decadent life where I wonder what to do with the oodles of time I have to myself, I want to believe in that fantasy too. I shut my eyes, and imagine myself all alone on some beach, holding a tall glass of chilled Sangria and a copy of “The Lowland” by Jhumpa Lahiri (of which I have read the first chapter four times, as I have never had the free time to escalate to the second), the cool sea breeze mixed with the hot sun lulling me to sleep… and just then, a squirt of tepid water hits my face. I open my eyes to see her standing there, looking impatient, with the jet spray pointed towards me like a gun:

“Mamma, why are you sleeping on the potty? Come on quick! Wash yourself!”

And I’m back to reality.

Passionate Souls to Paneer Rolls: Post Baby Romance

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My husband asks me, “Should I remove the foil before eating the paneer tikka roll or eat it as it is?” I can’t believe what he’s asking me and I make him repeat himself several times. And then it hits me- it’s the most romantic thing he has said to me in years! After being married for over a decade, I find that romance is hidden in these silly statements.

The flowers have gone. The gifts are rare to come by. The last time my husband visited an Archie’s to purchase a card had to have been when I was his girlfriend. Now he doesn’t even sign his name on the pre-bought cards that are yellowing in our drawer, which I discreetly leave by his bedside on the eve of an occasion. All the romance that I had been taught of, by movies and Sweet Dream novels in my teenhood, has ceased to exist.

After the arrival of a naughty little girl into our lives, cuddle time has turned into muddle time as we try to awkwardly hug each other around her sleeping body, lying between us. And the last time I heard him whisper sweet nothings to anyone, it was to Baby A, after she had indulged in her daily paternal-buttering-up, telling him that she loved him to the sun and back and then some more, while plastering his face with butterfly kisses.

Nandy (my hubby) has never been an overly expressive individual and he’s someone who strongly believes that actions speak louder than words. I, being a writer at heart and a literature student by degrees, have had a hard time understanding actions as a form of romance. What about love letters quoting Keats’ poetry or songs dedicated to me on Facebook?

And time has only made us increasingly complacent in our marriage. We have become an old married couple that even forgets to hold hands sometimes at the theatre, but we just cannot function without each other. We have become extensions of each other, fiery in our separate opinions (which results in frequent arguments) but merged in our need to have the other’s approval in what we do. How else can you explain a 37 year old man, with a great amount of familiarity with rolls and food packaging in general, asking his wife whether he needs to take the foil off before eating? When, in my defence, I haven’t ever been the mothering wife who likes to feed her husband or make each golgappa with her own hands before placing it into his mouth (for fear that he might injure his delicate finger as he jabs into the crunchy puri, or gets too much channa in but not enough aloo, throwing him off- balance).

Every weekend, Nandy asks me what to wear and he earnestly inquires as to whether his Sunday ensemble (a white shirt with purple pants and black chappals) looks good, even though it looked the same every Sunday before that one. He asks me to proofread and approve of every SMS that he composes casually for a friend, or any Facebook post that he wishes to put up. Nandy asks me if he should visit the loo when he leaves the restaurant or when he gets home!

Now I know that the common consensus among everyone reading this would be that I’m a crazy, controlling wife who mustn’t be letting him breathe without my permission, but I’m really not. I have never told him what he must wear, how he must eat, how he must write or anything else! It’s just that we have been together forever (from high school sweethearts to post-baby grouches) and so he feels more comfortable after taking a second opinion from me- for the most inane things. He usually does what he likes anyway, but this need to know what I think is what becomes the romance in our relationship.

Romance evolves, just like our marriages evolve, and I can’t help but feel a warmth in my heart (very similar to the one I felt when he wrote me silly, rhyming poems that told me why he loved me- mostly making fun of me- in college) when he sits confused now, curling his hair, and then turns to ask me, “Should I have a cold coffee or lassi?” I smile, knowing how much he loves me, and reply “Lassi” knowing fully well what he will say next. And I’m right.

“Ramu, ek cold coffee banana!” (Ramu, make me a cold coffee!), he shouts, as I cuddle up to him, knowing everything in the world is right where it should be.

It’s in the genes: my little Marwari Sethani!

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As a psychology student in college, we went deep into the “nature v/s nurture” (genes v/s socialization) debate and never came out with any conclusive winner. Now, as I have created my own little specimen who I can evaluate through my psychological microscope, I have to say that nature accounts for a lot.

I call BabyA (my 3 year old) my “little Marwari Sethani” because that’s exactly what she is! She seems to have taken her looks from my side but her nature wholly resembles my husband’s side. She can out-eat any spicy-blooded Bikaneri in a Bhujiya or Papad eating competition, and every time she comes out of Music Class, she can never leave without ordering a paan from the paanwala who sits outside, as I crumble in shame in front of the other mommies who are probably judging me: how crass is a pawn-chewing toddler? What can I say? She’s got Maru genes! I can just see her, a year or two later, standing on Marine Drive and telling the paanwala, “Ek Chotti Baby ka paan banana” (Make my usual).

We haven’t made her eat bhujiya, papad or paan but she has naturally gravitated to these things, even though we avoid having them lying at home due to health reasons. And her innate Maruness never ceases to surprise me. Even the way she needs things to be organized, or else you will find her bordering on a nervous breakdown, is completely reflective of my husband’s family. My mom is Punjabi and her house is very clean on the outside but her cupboards and drawers are a mess- as are mine! I grew up seeing my dadi (who’s mostly Marwari- we’re a majorly hybrid family) spending an hour every morning, cleaning her 6 cupboards! I always pondered over the futility of this chore because how dirty could the cupboards have gotten in a day? And then I got married into a house where distant relatives would come home and ask me, “Tumhara cupboard dekhao- tum kaise rakhti ho?”(Show me your cupboard. I want to see how neatly do you maintain it?) I would open my cupboards, and as my clothes and bags would shower down upon us (the shower of shame, as I call it), I knew that I had failed the “Marwari Sethani Acid Test” (Marwari daughter-in-law Acid Test).

Aranya has gone on her Dadi and Grand-Dadi (and most of the 9 other family members that l live with): She needs order outside for her to feel comfortable on the inside. The frames in her room must be positioned at right angles on the wall, her crayons must be kept top to bottom in a very long vertical line when she colours and her twin- elephant cushions must stand on her bed, trunks entwined, facing each other. When I enter the house, if I stand around a minute too long in my shoes, in MY room, she asks me repeatedly to remove my shoes and put them in the drawer, and finally pushes me out of them and puts them in herself! And at the age of 2, she has thrown her beloved dadi out of her room for having the gall to step inside with her home slippers!

I know she may see people being fastidious at home, but I am her primary care-giver as no one spends as much time as I do with her. I know she looks up to me, but I’m not Bikaneri by blood or heart. I love Lijjat’s Garlic papad, Haldiram aloo Bhujiya (which the Bikaneris do not even acknowledge as Bhujiya and disregard by categorizing as a measly food accessory: “sev”), commercially available “Mother’s” pickle and I don’t have a neat bone in my body: all the things that would make any Bikaneri flinch. Yet, she is nothing like me in her habits (besides her love for books and overactive imagination)! Just the way sticking out her tongue when she’s concentrating on something, like her dad, is genetically programmed into her, God seems to have set this maniacal neatness and discerning, fiery taste-buds into her DNA, to make my in laws and hubby happy, and to completely mess with my cluttered, (mostly) Punjabi brain!

Downtime: Sleep Hater Baby!

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BabyA has never been much of a sleeper. From the moment we set eyes on her, she wanted to set eyes on everything else. Shut-eye was an ordeal for her, and making her shut them was a bigger ordeal for me.

The first year of her life, it took at least an hour to make her sleep (sometimes two). I would rock her, pat her, make white noise (since it mimics the sounds of the womb), make her sleep in various gravity- defying positions on my lap to comfort her colic, sing to her till my throat went hoarse and walk with her till my legs were ready to give way. Finally, she would fall asleep, and I wouldn’t move for 15 minutes (watching the clock tick-tock, praying she doesn’t stir), whether my bladder was ready to burst or my feet were plagued with pins and needles. Then I would gently put her in her cot, repeating God’s name over and over again, and if she didn’t wake up, I would settle by her side. Often, this was the time when I could focus on my own bodily and mental needs, so I would hungrily open a bag of chips, and pop one in my mouth. “Crunch!”, and there, she was awake again!

She has always been a sleep-hater! This child can sit through a car-ride for 3 hours from Pune to Bombay, in a car-seat and not catch a wink. What I wouldn’t do for a little magic potion to make her sleep? My mom would say, “After a maalish (massage), you children (her teen anmol ratan) would sleep so well that I could go watch an afternoon film show and come back to catch you just beginning to awaken”.

I never understood whether it was evolution that was affecting this generation of babies: our own prenatal (and postnatal) environments that were filled with stress due to our high strung mindsets and highly mobile life, or something else. I searched and searched… and later found out that our mothers really did have a magic potion. It was available off-the-counter as “Woodward’s Gripe Water”. Now, I know that we have the option of giving gripe water although it has lost some popularity in the last 30 years, but what we don’t have any longer is the alcoholic variety! I searched high and low for the old style gripe water WITH ALCOHOL but I can’t get it even if I pay a million bucks (I know because I was willing to!) All brands of gripe water now have a huge sign saying “without alcohol”. Why would they do this: a little alcohol never hurt anyone, especially a sleep-hater baby. For all those judging me, I feel like if we turned out right after a peg of gripe water every morning, then it can’t be so bad for our kids!

I have read several articles that tell you how many hours of sleep a child needs. BabyA fell short of that by 2-3 hours every time. This didn’t really work well with me, since the one thing I find hardest to deal with is Sleep Deprivation. I can handle the tantrums and the terrible twos but I need 8 hours of sleep, otherwise I’m like a Neanderthal (club in hand, and all) moving around with a mercurial temper.

Moms who are blessed with kids who love their sleep will never know what I’m talking about and moms who are right now mentally composing their scathing comments about Sleep Training Techniques want to whip me. Let’s just say, sleep training wasn’t for me. I know it would have saved me much misery (especially the months where she would wake up every hour throughout the night, expecting to be comforted by a 20 minute drill each time), but I couldn’t!

So I trundled along, singing lullabies and doing a solid workout while trying to make her sleep. From 2 hours, we have been able to come down to 30-45 minutes, the kindness of which I thank BabyA for every day. But I must say, till date, I never have any clue when she will knock off because there are no classic sleep symptoms: No typical reduction of movement, decrease in conversation, glassy-eyes, yawning… Nothing! In fact, till the second before she falls into deep slumber (if she knows such a condition), she will be either singing on the top of her voice or talking continuously, while twirling, whirling and swirling all over my bed.

But finally, after so many varied physically defying stunts to make her sleepy, she relents… she stops moving and talking. And there she is: asleep. As I place her down and tuck her in, all the frustration melts away. I look at her angelic face, so devoid of any malevolence, and my heart always skips a beat. I can’t believe I created this mysterious tiny miracle!