Dear Bablu Dadu*1,

i write this letter as i sob, silently, alone, knowing fully well that this will not reach you. but i also know you will understand perfectly why i am still writing this to you when you are no more.

i got the news of your death two days back and since then i have been sad, really sad. now of course, i have learnt to deal with this strange phenomenon called death. i do no longer crumble on the outside, though there is a deep agony inside. but this will pass and i will get back to being my boisterous self, once again. i can see you giggle, with that characteristic twinkle in your eye and that naughty wave passing all over you.

you were not strictly even related to me or my family. you were Mashi's*2 father-in-law's cousin. it is strange that we got to know you... but had Mesho*3 not passed away, we would not have...

i can distinctly recall the first day i met you at the Kasba house where Mashi was staying with her daughters, sometime in 1983-84 and you had come to take us for a recital of Rabindrasangeet by Sumitra Sen. it was raining cats and dogs. the second meeting, same place, this time it was Jaws II.

thereafter you started coming home, often, but not regularly, mostly in the evenings, after work. you spoke little, sipped a cuppa, had a snack if offered and left silently. Dad liked you and often teased you to get married. and sure enough you did... around 1988-89. Ma and i had gone for your wedding reception. you looked happy, so did your bride.

years passed, i got married but you stayed in touch with my natal home... you kept visiting and each time, i visited, we would meet... you would make the effort to come and meet us, sometimes even late in the evenings. you had a son, he had an accident, at a marriage party, recovered... got into school, grew up, passed his 10th boards...

i kept up with your life as you did... you soothed my pain after Dad's demise, you constantly kept coming home, now my home. B liked you and understood the friendship we had. we shared a lot of time talking and in that, i was pained to learn that your wife and son did not really love you... i am busy with the lump in my throat now... and you are again smiling, i can see that...

you had retired from your job by now, but took up another... not so much for money but to get out of home every morning and as an excuse to return late at night, grab a bite and fall off to sleep. i recall your pain when i told you that i was deeply addicted to sleeping pills. you even threatened to blow the whistle and let B know if i did not stop...

i am out of my addiction. i am happy once again, having gone through a rough patch... and we met again this time when i went on vacation... you seemed ok, i could not prod you beyond the apparent, since everyone was around. you did promise to come back on the last day, but called to say you could not and said, "i am not feeling well."

how would i gauge that i had to blow the whistle to your wife? how would i know that your time was up?

on second thoughts, i have done some soul searching and come up with a logic for not calling in your wife... you had lost all will to live...

as a friend, i understood that, in my sub-conscious mind... and have accepted the fact that i did what i did, by design.

i again can see that grin of yours... a loving one this time, for your friend and sister, as you called me... and now the tears will not allow me to carry on.

S, the name you knew me in...

*1 Bablu -- a common name in our part of India; Dadu -- grandfather.
*2 Mashi -- Ma's sister
*3 Mesho -- Mashi's husband.

the place of the significant other...

... in our lives, depends a lot on attitude, in fact whole of it.

have seen couples who portray a total lack of balance when it comes to their spouses, because the lady decides willingly to be a doormat. the man is clearly more equal than the woman and the woman either does not know what she has traded away (identity), or does not want to have one. that's one way.

then there are others where the lady wears the pants, because the man is docile and takes the passive role. here, the man has less of an identity. that's another option. the straight ones, both these, i call them.

the third way is made by couples who have, knowingly, shunned both the above and want a decent space for each of them(selves)... and that is the trick, since even if they are clear, on how much they will yield to each other and constantly think hard of how well to finetune it, people around who have seen an either/or scenario, do not know what is going on in these homes... i happen to fall in this third bracket.

B and i met 25 years back, as college students, in the same class. we have courted for 6+ years, and have been married for the past 18+ years. so the question of inequality really did not arise, to begin with.

so after marriage, while we both were clear in our minds, people around were not. my folks knew better... that to comment would be inviting problems and they steered clear. his folks stumbled a little in the beginning and have let it be.

running the home is my responsibility. he earns, i manage. i decide what is to be bought, what is to be cooked, what is to be washed and ironed, what is to be junked. and i love doing it. where i cannot, i seek paid help, in cooking for instance.

i manage R too... keeping my schedules as closely linked to hers, her studies, her classes, the works... where i cannot, B pitches in willingly.

we use each other as sounding boards for our doubts in life, in general.

we have kept one aspect separate -- money. i manage mine; he manages his, though we do know what the other is doing and not doing. we are more mature here and do not question. possibly, we have developed a certain respect in each other's judgement.

rather a plain arrangement, it struck me yesterday when, at a get-together of B's colleagues, one wife from Category 1, commented that she had the liberty of spending $4200 on a diamond bangle and mind you, she does not work for a living. this bangle was just to complete a set with a diamond necklace that her husband had got for her earlier in the year.

the mention has not saddened me or surprised me, it has just made me more conscious of one fact -- i come really cheap... only hope B realises it.

why can't i be a martyr

this is clear why she does not like martyrs. i am with her on all she says -- that does not call for a post, though. what calls for a post is to state why i just cannot tolerate them and why i find it difficult to be one.

martyrs are irritating, period. enough said, no more emphasis needed.

they lack self-respect, thus they crib and only crib.

they bitch because they lack the courage to speak up in front of people, they have objections on.

and they whine, because that is the only thing they can do. they are sufficient for only that.

i have a Mt. Everest-ish ego. and i have tonnes of self-respect. i do not crib because it hurts my sense of privacy; i bitch, yes, but i also tell most people on their faces what i think on issues, i rarely comment on people and i hate to whine since i do not want sympathy or advice... my problem is mine and i can tackle it, if at all. i prefer not to have half-baked ideas as advice.

and most important, i can stand up for myself, which is one thing i keep drilling into R. let's see how she turns out to be, anything is fine, as long as she is not a martyr.

of kebabs and koftas

i am no cook... yes, i do cook, but that is only now, in the past 9 months, the longest stint in my cooking calendar.
but when i made the lamb kebab today, after R's contant reminder that i had promised to make some for her, and served them hot-from-the-
oven to her, she smiled a smile that she has never...
and that is what pushes me to cook these days -- the look on her face which shines with an unexplained happiness tinged with a dash of pride.
and guess whom she befriended to share this little message with me... my Ma, who is (or is it was??) the best cook i have met and known...
R told her, on being served consecutive meals made by her grandmom this summer, that she wished her mom too would cook the same dishes -- malpoa, lau, shukto... peppered with her own kebab, kofta and pudding...
and honestly, i have made all the three on R's wishlist...
children have their own way of getting things done, and i do believe, R told Ma, not to get the things she wants, but trusts the impact of something that Ma will tell me to do...
some things go beyond explanation... and the bond that R shares with both her grandmoms is unique... with one, it is still like a child, with pranks, jokes and laughter; with the other, she acts like a full-blown adult, keeping her reserve and limit. and both these, she plays with equal ease, poise and a lot of confidence.
i relished watching both of these role-plays last vacation home... it was R's first visit as a teenager, and i was sceptical that she might show her ugly self there... the mother in me would be hurt then... but blood ties brought out the best in her and she behaved herself to the T, and needed no prompting whatsoever... it was as if, she never lived without our folks.

living with two MEs

a strange feeling, sometimes a little weird, sometimes funny because of the complete opposites that get thrown up, at times outright boring because of the sheer repititiveness, other times a simply enjoyable pastime, and i am sure, this is no unique sitiuation, that i am not alone in this, that there are countless other loners who go through this and it is because they enjoy this dialogue, the two MEs grow, they are nourished, fed, bathed, clothed and let to live, only in the mind...

i call them my Big Me and my Small Me... the two guys who live inside me, relentlessly talking, talking in long soliloquies, or mono-sentences, as the mood is...

let's me recount one dialogue that has been happening for quite sometime now...



Big Me (BM): why blog?

Small Me (SM): why not? it feels good to let go of words and feelings that lie inside.

BM: words yes, feelings no. can i be open with feelings here?

SM: oh, you and open with feelings???? not possible, buddy... that is the because of your Spastic Colon, am i correct?

BM: behave yourself and i am not your buddy, understand... why talk irrelevant things? i was just raising a question and you have come out with an unrelated problem...

SM: i thought it was related... you are constipated in mind and body (the latter has resulted in the colon disorder)...ok, ok sorry, be less touchy...

BM: why blog?

SM: you are back to where you started... but as i said, i am all for telling what i feel, and care not for what others think about me...

BM: that is the reason why you and me are different, though we live in the same mind. that is the reason why your mental age does not increase and mine has never decreased, though we keep talking to each other.

SM: keep to the basics... mental age is a factor of the mind... i do not have one... but jokes aside, why aren't you writing? why are you not giving vent to what is inside you?

BM: call it a writer's block, a thinker's block, but there is some sort of a block and so many questions...

SM: like?

BM: i asked you one: why blog? rather how should one blog, since you have already answered my earlier question?

SM: what do you mean?

BM: how honest can one be? how honest should one be?

SM: for me, both are same... what i can do, i should do; what i can say, i should say...

BM: that is the reason why you are S and i am B... for me there is a yawning gap between should and can...i cannot do all that i should be doing; i should not do all that i can do...

SM: for once, keep your rhetorics aside and go write. just get off all the blocks and communicate with yourself loud. it's fine, it does not really matter that others might read your blog and read into your mind... all who come here to write, write with a view to getting a free mind... that is the idea.

BM: for starters, i will publish this dialogue... Yipee!!!

40 years back...

when i was roughly 2...
Umm, this emotion is universal, i guess...
i don't know whether the man here held another child or not; i guess he had...
but the care is so palpable... something that will never ever happen, and something i will miss perpetually...

and now the real answers... and how i now reside in Pluto

honestly, i was crest fallen with the earlier post... i hit a depression, cried and cried to friends (something that is really really difficult) and decided to speak to her... she said the earlier answers were JOKES and could i take them seriously??? i said, "Ok. then send me the correct, serious answers by mail. but no buttering." she instantly said, "i do not butter people, and in this i am like you and Pa."

and here are the real answers...

What is something I always say to you?
To be independent
** how well she has read me**

What makes me happy?
When im happy…so r u

What makes me sad?
When im sad…..so r u

** can i gloat a little over these two??**

How do I make you laugh?
Actually….im the funny one

Like?
Ummm….im not very funny….but I laugh at my own jokes…and some of yours too.

What do you think I was like as a child?
Honour student!!! Proud one at that

** Ma, r u hearing this??**

How old am I?
Ur a baby!!!!!! =)

How tall am I?
A bit shorter than me

**this is true**

What is my favourite thing to do?
Read….sleep….talk to me

What do I do when you’re not around?
Think of me??? Hahahahah….i don’t know….read?

If I become famous, what will it be for?
Writing a book…..you better get started

**i am hitting the rooftop, better tell the world that i do not fit here any more :))**

What am I really good at?
At giving pep talks

Really?
yes

What am I not really good at?
Your pretty much good at everything….mabye maths??

**my new address is Crater No. 10, Jupiter :)))))**

What is my job?
Journalist…mother…wife…daughter

** she is mistaken on the order... it is Journalist, Mother, Daughter, then Wife, but i will let that be, for her and her Pa's sake**

What is my favourite food?
Dal and rice

** she knows i am a proletariat with simple living, high thinking**

What makes you proud of me?
that you’re…..ummmm….independent

**folks, i am on Hillock No 581, Pluto**

What makes me proud of you?
Duh…that im ATRAYEE MUKHERJEE….that should make you proud enough!!

**it DOES, for sure**

What do you and I do together?
I explain to you about hannah montanna

How are we the same?
Looks wise

How are you and I different?
We have very different opinions…tastes

How do you know that I love you?
Because I just know

**Muaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah**

What is one thing you wish you could change about me?
Make you thinner

**we have the same wishlist :)) which will not materialise**

Now tell me what you feel about this... me and my fragile maternal ego will feel better...