The road never ends

I followed my off day routine and started the day with the newspapers. Freedom, independence, 60 years, these terms seem to be predominantly spread across pages, across newspapers. That day of the year, to voice opinions about this republic, its current state, to bask in its conceived glory and criticize its many shortcomings which for some reason are somebody else’s doings.

And on this day I do not have an opinion or feel anything for the country or its independence or impending super power status or the still continuing caste atrocities and female feticides. That’s a far cry from the younger person I used to be. Now at exactly half the age of this independent country I seem to have reached a state of absolute disconnect from the world that I once inhabited. Consumed completely by a world conjured up by my mind, with no place for anything beyond me. This freedom that is so much talked about is something I have always had but never recognized it until I was much grown up and couldn’t understand women who accepted not having it.

I had a friend in my childhood, named Zeenat by her father but the name was traded off for a more Hindu sounding name. Zeenat was born a day before me or maybe just half a day before me. I was born sometime after midnight and that’s how our birth dates happened to be different, although our mothers had gone into labour on the same day. She stayed with her maternal grandparents and an assortment of uncles and aunts, her mother’s sibling. Her parents chose to keep her younger brother with them but not her because the locality they stayed in was not conducive for girls or their house was quite small or I think a combination of those two reasons.

Zeenat did not have any of the liberties that I enjoyed. She was not allowed to play at any hour of the day; she was not allowed to watch late night movies screened on cloth screens on the roads during Ganesh Chaturthi; we were both notorious for not doing our homework and skipping studies, as compensation she had to do lessons even in the summer holidays while I got the entire two months off.

But Zeenat had a way to turn all the restrictions into nothing and have fun. She stole pickles from right under her grandma’s nose with me standing guard at the kitchen door; she stored the lunch she didn’t want to eat in the part of her dress that was held with elastic at the waist and dispose it off when she went to throw the litter from her house in the afternoon. She had great skill for stealing and under her patronage I too got to hone my embezzling skills. She swore, lied, stole, danced, devised plans to eliminate or at least cause a lil harm to her brother, with me party to it except for the swearing and lying, she did everything that her family if they had known would have punished her for. In spite of all the restrictions, Zeenat lived up every moment at least those years when we were together and never took her rebellion too far or too seriously.

Our lives have turned out quite differently. We had lost touch when my family moved out of that building. But somehow we got in touch in our teen ages, back then for her the obvious thing to do was to find a guy and get hitched, while I thought it best to find my bearings first. She did exactly what she had set out to do and I, well, am still walking the path.

Lately, and I would say unfortunately, I am coming across too many people, especially women who seem to think they have a right to mould me in their (right) ways, as if I am a wayward lock that can be set back in its place with lots of oil and persistent combing. So friendly advices about how it is high time I get married have been steadily coming my way. But it’s not the right catch I am looking for (somehow it seems to be the most difficult thing for all and sundry to grasp). If anything, I am looking to quiet this growing discontent. This discontent, which has always been a part of me but would pop its head out only once in a while and most of the time allow me to live in my bubble. But it has grown now and reached its crescendo and will leave me only when it is sure I understand the reason behind its presence.

There is this other persistent noise (that’s growing with my age) not part of me that keeps trying to win over my inner voice, that discontent that keeps me going. It is the voice of this collective conventional idea of a woman. The idea, which has nothing much in common with me. That’s why I think even my closest men friends sometimes tell me, ‘but you are not a woman, you are a man’, they are of course joking and want to irritate me. But come to think of it we do not joke about something repeatedly unless somewhere we agree with the concept. But I had never wanted to be a man, cause I figured I could do whatever I wanted to by being a woman. But that’s not how I believe it is for other women, as my colleague said to me the other day, “I wouldn’t think of getting married if I was a man, but! I am a woman.” I didn’t say anything in response. I am just glad I figured out I can be a woman and be free to make and live my destiny.