Of marriages falling apart….

It has been a bad week. Not for me personally, although, it has been emotionally draining. Met up with a dear friend yesterday after months of us being busy with our individual lives. It has always been this way, we go months without meeting or chatting, and get together like there had never been any break. This time round it was a little strange. She called one morning, with a strange edge to her voice. “Where are you Kiran, I’ve had a serious operation…” I promised to come over pronto. So I did. Went across to find a frail shadow of the vivacious, bubbly, pretty friend I knew and loved. I was shocked. I gathered, she had been operated for cancer. And in the course of the conversation, found out that her husband, an ugly dork if there ever was one, was cheating on her with a 22 year old working in his office. My heart sank. It was a pattern I had seen just a couple of weeks ago, when another friend shifted base back to her mother’s home thanks to a cheating husband, who was also violent to boot. I wanted to run home and hug my husband tight and count all my blessings on the stars and thank every God I know for the wonderful man I have married. I dont know what tomorrow will bring, but for now, I know that I am blessed. Imagine being operated on for cancer and a husband who has shucked off on a foreign jaunt with his keep?

But then she is a trusting soul. She says she allowed him to have his one night stands during her complete bedrest pregnancies, where she gave him his two beautiful children. That was the death knell. It gave him the license to fool around all he wanted, and it continued after the kids were born and grown. Would I have given my husband such a licence, I thought, though I had been on a risky pregnancy too. Never. Not on my life. Being married to me implies total and complete fidelity–emotional and physical. Am I old fashioned? Perhaps. And if there have been one night stands in my marriage, I dont want to know. Because the day I know, is the day I would pick the brat and walk out. I am that unforgiving a person, and I have been 200 per cent emotionally, mentally and physically faithful to the spouse. I expect the same. To be weighed down by a spouse’s infidelity while going through cancer treatment is something I couldnt digest at all. I wept for her. And counted my blessings. And was very very scared.

At the mall…

It was one of those evenings. The air was hot and humid. The airconditioner was on full blast. The brat was on turbo powered overdrive. And I was beyond slothfull. If I could have someone go to the loo for me I would have. The mother was pushed to the point of no return and was barking at the walls, thanks to the brat having made her spin wheels of the helicopters till the cows came home. It was the no mans land time between evening and night, and beloved friend Sonu had gone off on a Mumbai darshan jaunt with assorted junta from his friend circle. Therefore the bright idea of taking the brat to the mall. “He’ll run around for a bit. He’ll tire himself out and go to sleep easily,” I told the mother in great hope. “And I can window shop.” Fat chance. She gave me a look and warned me, “I cant run after him, my legs are aching.” But the flame of hope burns eternal in the heart, so we changed him into what we thought was a great ensemble, only to have him throw rolling on the floor tantrums to wear a jacket that has been so outgrown it looks like a shrug on him, over flared bermudas and open sandals. If I could, I would refuse to be seen accompanying him lest it be attributed to my poor taste. This, thinking back to the many instances when I have sneered dismissively at the horrible clothes people have made their kids wear in public places, avowing my kid would always be the best dressed of the lot. Now I know better, and also know that the best laid outfits by moms are discarded for tacky uncoordinated ensembles that would suit rag pickers. And my sartorially inclined prince has tastes quite his own. And will dress the way it pleases him. Never mind what fashion dictates.

So there we were at the mall, Mother, me and brat. With the brat running in circles round the atrium in dizzying speed all set on dashing into unsuspecting adults and upsetting popcorn all over. The mother, true to her word, rested her wearing legs on a bench meant expressly for the purpose, at which brat took umbrage at her resting peacefully rather than running squealing behind him all over the place. “Nana, get up. Do running.” Nana left him unheeded. He continued to rock the joint, as they say. In the midst of running all over the place, he managed to get into a Lilliput store and con the salestaff to get him into a Spiderman Tshirt, and then get me to shell the money for it, by refusing to change out of it… (In troth, I couldnt be more pleased, the jacket was happily discarded into the trash can). I sashayed into a shop with cute little polka dot tops hanging in the window, just begging to be bought. “Sorry Madam. No in XL.” Could have slugged my bag at him, weighed down as it was with sipper and assorted foodstuffs for the brat. Slunk out of the shop and salvaged the situation by getting into the sunglasses shop and picking up a pair of Versace sunglasses. Beautiful slate grey, with metallic sides and the Medusa head on the side. A lot of guilt happened. After all, its been barely a couple of months since the Dior I picked up in Goa. Never have I been turned away by footwear salespersons or sunglasses salespersons or handbag salespersons. Or perfume salespeople for that matter. In fact, their faces light up with a million sparkly bulbs when I visit, literally falling over their feet to drag me into their stores. Then I went ahead and picked up a perfume I really didnt need. And having blown up some hardearned money, I resolved to take an appointment with the psychiatrist next week to resolve this shopaholism. Will resolve unresolved issues next week. For now, just wanted to feel good. And buying makes one feel good. What was that study about women in the UK who prefered shopping over sex? And did they just add me to the list?

Here comes the big spender goes the song in the background, and I can actually see them wring their hands in anticipation when I enter. Perhaps that explains why I have such a surfeit of all these. Thought to ponder: The person who invents the one size fits all outfit will be a multimillionaire guaranteed. Perhaps a fabric that stretches to accommodate excess bulk and automatically shrinks to fit a leaner silhouette…is anyone listening out there?

Happy Birthday darling husband…

For some backgrounder on this phenomenon. The husband is the youngest in a family of five siblings. Can just hear you going, ‘Aww spoilt brat!” You guessed right. He is. No two ways about it. He is so used to being hero worshipped by the rest of the family, he actually expects the rest of the world to do the same. Cant blame him too. Handsome charming dude that he is, and this is not just me blinded by my love for him. Being obscenely goodlooking does mean that the rest of the clan tends to hero worship him a bit. In fact, to the extent that he presumes that his entire clan should shelve their jobs, lives and irate spouses and land up to celebrate his birthday. The best part of this presumption is that they actually all do. Fuming husbands of sis in laws are left to fend for themselves for the entire time they vamoose off to celebrate their kid bro’s birthday. And I see the trend continuing with the brat’s birthday. What helps of course, is the fact that his birthday comes bang in the midst of the school summer vacations which makes it easy to drag school going kids away. Therefore, every May is a huge celebration time, with three sisters, their kids and the brother down for an extended blast. This time round, we had a short trip to Daman. The original plan was to go down to Goa which was shelved at the last minute, thanks to yours truly chickening out, remembering the last time we drove down in January during the extended Republic Day weekend which saw the brat bringing up nonstop all the way there, making us hotfoot it to the hospital the moment we touched Panjim. So we opted for unexplored Daman. Which, in retrospect, would have been better left unexplored since there was absolutely nothing there to explore. Dry parched landscape. Fumes of chemicals and oil in the air. Apart from oil slicked rocky beaches and a really bad counterfeit market that even an inveterate shopper like me turned away from in sheer revulsion. And boy was it hot. A trip to check out the market saw us wrung out like sponges and making a bee line back for the hotel rooms and the comfort of air conditioners with chilled beers. The adults that is. The kids settled for chilled Pepsi. We spent the rest of our minibreak in beer induced stupor venturing out only to the hotel restaurant to feed ourselves or sitting around the edges of the swimming pool, smirking at obese ladies clad in tights and lycra spandex enhanced full sleeved tshirts for modest swimming. Like the full sleeves and the full length tights do anything to conceal the size of the individuals bursting within their nylon thread reinforced seams. Or maybe one was just envious of their courage in venturing out in swimwear while one couldnt dare even show milk bottle ankles. And anyway, one snorted in derision, the pool was just about two feet deep and four feet wide. A glorified kiddy pool. Not worthy of us getting in. Trying to kid the world that one actually didnt care to swim in such an unworthy pool, trying hard to conceal the fact that one would probably sink like a stone had one tried to get in, keeping aside the fact that me in a swimsuit would have the rest of guests run away retching in disgust at this horrifying vision. The husband and the bro in law, Asiad level swimming and diving champions decided to get into the water and give the kids some training. This saw the rest of the guests lolling around on the deck chairs perk their ears up and start listening with such rapt attention, that they shovelled their brats in line to take instruction. A long line gradually built up for diving instruction. A woman asked me if I knew who the coach was, and didnt he come in some television serial. No, I replied, distractedly. Of course, he comes in a television serial, she persisted assertively, whats his name. No, I snapped back, I should know. He’s my husband. She slunk away after giving me a head to toe look that was all sympathy for this Greek God being tied down to this Geek Goddess. The husband suddenly realised that he had begun coaching the entire slew of kids present in the resort rather than the four kids from the family, who had slunk into the kiddy pool section for general lazing around rather than active training, having gallantly vacated pool space for the eager learners. Ah, the sloth of this generation. They sat around in the baby pool discussing French manicures and cute basketball coaches until their mothers physically threatened to throw them out of the pool if they didnt want to get the full benefit of benevolent uncle turned coach’s wisdom. The brat conquered his fear of water and wanted to be in the pool morning, afternoon, evening. And paddled around like a little dog with his arm floats and only a moue of a face visible in that flurry of activity. The brat’s birthday comes around in October. No doubt the family will be down again, this time round because the brat is the youngest of the lot. Do I see a pattern being repeated here? Happy birthday my darling husband. All my love isnt enough for all the love I wish to give you.

Since am very lazy….

…will leave you with pics from our holiday….

The paunch on permagrow

My first post on wordpress. Rather like a first date with a new crush. Everything is new and unfamiliar. But what I really find I like right now is the fact the text size is really superduper humunguous huge which means I can type unhindered without squinting furiously at the screen from behind contact lensed eyes that I suspect are going in the bifocal way. Ah, am ageing so badly, it feels the body is crumbling in everyway possible. Anyway, the topic under discussion in this post is the paunch. The presence of. Which I discovered rather sadly in the mirror of a changing room when I went in to try out a pair of jeans. Ambitiously, these were low waisted ones, which then had a huge roll of stretch marked dimpled and jiggly fat slurp itself over the waistband and hang lose in the no mans land between breast line and hip line. Never try on low waisted jeans in a changing room with three sided Belgian mirrors guaranteed to give you a perfect specific reflection, which is undoubtedly one you dont want to see. In full glory, the tyres at the once supple waistline brought me to tears. And the saddlebags were magnified so dreadfully was sure I was looking at a trick mirror, one of the sort that is actually meant for the funny hall of mirrors in the fairs of one’s childhood where one laughed at oneself and went out secure in the knowledge that one was nothing like the reflection in the mirror. The naughty paunch is on permagrow. Yes, I have been overindulging a bit lately. Its holiday season and mango season and visitor season. Like last year, it all adds up to mega kilos of fat and flab gathering force around the body. Promise to crack the whip on self and get that recalcitrant paunch tucked back inside as soon as school starts. What is it about becoming a mom, and scheduling one’s life around the brat’s school calendar?Just back from a mini break where it seems I have spent the entire three days lounging around the pool on a sun deck chair, downing beer and chicken lollipops, (yes, thats me, the fat one, eating like a porcine relative of the oinkers), and bloating. Last week I put the paunch down to PMS, but this week couldnt really hang onto that lame excuse since was done with the flow of the excess water retention. Okay, will now dispense with the pretence of exercising and get down to really serious exercising. Which means I will now walk to the car instead of having it driven to the point of exit of the stairway. What a slacker I am…..

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