 |
| September (First) 2010 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
| DELHI PRESS MAGAZINES : WOMAN'S ERA |
|
WOMAN'S ERA /
FICTION (10/21) / VAHINIS BANGLES
| Vahini's Bangles |
| “Perhaps I suffer from an illusion... but first you love someone as dearly as I loved my Vahini and then see.” |
| By Y. G. Joshi |
|
To dip into one’s memories of childhood is like opening a jackfruit. One has to break through the hard and fibrous exterior of so many intervening years of forgetfulness to get to the juicy, fleshy bits of memories. How sweet, though, once you get to them.
One’s earliest memory is usually of one’s mother. My mother died even before I could think of her consciously. The only way I can drag her memory into my narrative is by telling you that I used to argue with my friends that I was born without a mother!
The next memory that crops up is that my brother and I used to live by ourselves in a house. My brother used to cook. I would do the washing up, and Dada (my brother) put things away. Dada was twenty six and I nine.
Most of my friends had mothers or sisters – or Mai or Tai. We had no one. I felt sore about it. I asked Dada, “Why is it we have no mother or sister?”
“Fate willed it so,” he said.
I felt fate was a cruel thing to pursue small boys thus. Why couldn’t it wait till one grew up?
In the month of Chaitra, there would be Kumkum Pooja (a women’s festival) in every house. We were often invited to our friends’ houses to eat the lovely meringues or spicy cooked gram. We could have no such pooja in our house.
One year Dada made all the eatables with his own hands and called all my friends. The food was there, but how dreary it all was without a woman’s touch to give it a meaning! We were poor. Dada got only 50 rupees for his job at the Collector’s office, but we did not lack anything.
The marriage season started in town. “Is anyone getting married in our house?” I wondered. I ran to Dada and asked him, “Dada, when could I get married?”
“When you grow up,” he said, patting me on the back.
“But, Dada, you are grown up, why don’t you get married?”
Dada just looked at me. Someone came to see him just then. I ran off to play at the neighbour’s.
There was a wedding on there. Lots of women had collected. I looked at them longingly. No one was my mother or sister!
I was back by Dada’s door in a little while. I overheard bits of a conversation which meant nothing to me at that time.
“No, I do not want to marry,” Dada was saying. “My brother is dependent on me. Suppose I marry and my wife does not get on with my brother? Suppose I also neglect him because of her?”
Every time I think of this conversation now, I feel like the hot baked earth which has just had a shower of rain!
Five years went by, nothing much happened. Dada was still unmarried.
It was a Saturday. I had just come back from school and was looking round for something to eat, when I heard Dada was engaged.
Dada! Engaged! I could not contain my excitement! My distant uncle through whose efforts this marriage was fixed was about, so I bottled up my excitement. As soon as he stepped out of the house, I ran to Dada and hugged him.
I said, “Dada, you are very naughty! Why did you fix up your wedding without consulting me? I must choose your bride!”
My uncle heard this. He asked Dada, “What, what is he saying?”
“He wants to ‘see’ his sister-in-law first,” said Dada shyly. My uncle looked at me and said, “I did not know you were such a devil! Go...go and ‘see’ her for yourself!”
“Dada, you come with me.”
“No, we can’t go again,” my uncle said. “It will look bad.”
I put on my clothes hurriedly. As I put on my cap, I said, “But, Dada, if I don’t like her, you are not to marry her then.”
“Yes, all right,” Dada laughed.
I ran out of the house. Dada called after me, “Where, where will you go, you madcap? You don’t know the place.”
I realised my mistake, then noted the address carefully and tried to collect some of my friends to go with me. Nobody was in. Eventually, I went alone to see the bride.
Vahini’s father met me outside the gate. “Where have you come from?” he asked me.
I didn’t bother to tell my name or address. I came to the point. “I want to ‘see’ my Dada’s bride,” I said. Vahini’s father was amused — he continued to address me in honorifics. I felt very grown up!
We went upstairs. The seating arrangements were still undisturbed. I went and sat near a bolster reclining against it. Vahini came and sat in front of me. I thought she was laughing within herself. I heard laughter inside the door too. I wondered what was making everyone feel so amused. I felt embarrassed.
My Vahini! The picture she made that day is clearly etched on my mind even now! How can I describe her! She was lovely like a goddess! I didn’t remember my mother but I had always carried an image of her in my mind. That image had come to life! I was looking at my mother in her girlhood!
“Do you want to ask any questions?” Vahini’s father asked, suppressing a smile.
I remember I was trying to put into words some vague question that was in my mind. No words would come out. Eventually, I got so utterly nervous that I ran out of the house without heeding anything. My words as I ran were, “Vahini! I am going.”
I told my Dada that I thoroughly approved of Vahini.
Dada was married. Our house became a home.
The light of the lamps lit in the house by Vahini’s hands had some added sweetness and beauty.
When newly married, Vahini used to go to her mother’s place ever so often. I felt “mother’s place” was a terrible thing!
Vahini would say, “Let me go, Bhouji — please — I am coming back tomorrow, anyhow.”
“Why must you go to your mother’s place so often, Vahini? Tomorrow, when you come, bring your mother’s place here, then you need not go again!”
“What a baby you are, Bhouji,” she would say.
Dada would say, “Chaudya (his pet name for me), you ass, you are after your Vahini all the time. You do not even talk to me. How about your schoolwork? I am sure you are neglecting it!”
And that is how it was. Since Vahini came, we had become friends. I was a little frightened of Dada.
Once Vahini and I fought over something. The reason escapes me. Vahini had brought some eatables from her mother’s place. Mostly it was I who had polished them off. Out of the quarrel only one sentence of Vahini’s I remember, “You grumble about my mother’s people but who ate up all the sweets prepared there?”
The quarrel was over, but I remembered this sentence and twisted it cruelly on another occasion.
Dada and I were invited to lunch at Vahini’s mother’s place. I did not say anything at first, but when Vahini’s mother came to call us at lunch time, I said to Dada, “I won’t go; you go; Vahini says I eat from her mother’s place.”
Naturally Dada was angry and he turned down the invitation. I was very pleased with myself for having shamed Vahini.
At noon, I saw Vahini and her father coming towards the house. (I feel such a worm even to write this now!) They were walking in the fierce noon sun, Vahini did not have even sandals on her feet, her hair was dripping with perspiration and it had smudged the red mark on her forehead unto her cheek.
She came panting to me and, though angry, said in the most entreating tone, “Bhouji, what is this? Why do you twist something I said in joke ages ago? Don’t be naughty now, come for lunch at once!”
She was saying this half in anger, half endearingly. It was like eating a lemon drop at once sour and sweet!!
I yielded. Dada and Vahini’s father walked ahead. I was holding an open umbrella on Vahini and making her walk in its shade. How happy we were talking in half-broken, inconsequential sentences!
Every festival day, the memory of this incident rises fresh in my mind and becomes unbearable with the weight of its sadness. To forget it, I go to the window to watch the road. I see many newly-married young girls going back and forth on the street. If I see anyone even slightly resembling my Vahini, a glow of warmth and satisfaction runs through me.
Years slipped by. I finished my education. My bride had to be selected. My Vahini was pretty but rather short. As one rises in life, one’s expectations rise too. We had seen at least 50 girls. No one met with my approval! Vahini got fed up!
She said, ‘’Bhouji, you are becoming very fastidious. Take care, one day you will fall for some girl who is nothing! I am not going to see any more girls. You make your choice and tell us.”
“Vahini, I have made up my mind! The first girl that comes after this, I shall marry!” I said half-jokingly.
It was a coincidence. The first girl that I saw after this, I really liked.
“Vahini, you go and see her now,” I said.
“‘Bhouji, what you like we like, there is no need to go and see.”
I had to coax her to go. We were sitting in Dada’s room when she came back. She came in laughing and looked at me as if she were seeing me for the first time!
She smiled — I had never seen her smile so. How can I describe it?
I felt shy and embarrassed, yet glared at her smile. She danced the palms of her hands in front of my face and said, “A-ha-ha, Bhouji, what a choice you have made! After rejecting so many girls, you choose this one! A nice long stick she is!”
“Vahini, I am doing this entirely for your convenience,” I said. “See, you are short, every time you want something from the top shelf, you have either to call us or to look for a chair or something! I thought I would give you a nice live ladder to work with. However, if you don’t like the idea, we can still say no!”
“Why will you say no? Because of me? No — not at all. Marry and live happily, my dear,” she said.
The marriage was then finally fixed. My wife’s family was much more well-to-do than ours. They behaved atrociously throughout the wedding. Vahini and Dada, therefore, went about like total strangers in the wedding. On the last day, in the ceremonial feast, neither of them came. Nobody pressed them to either!
“There was a little incident on the last day of the wedding. My wife’s brother asked me, “What are your plans now?”
I did not understand. I was likely to get a good job. I said so.
“Then you will make a separate establishment, won’t you?” My brother-in-law said. “Our Prabha (my wife) is very intelligent. She will make a model home for the two of you.”
“Model home? Only the two of us?” The whole meaning flashed through my mind. They wanted me to leave Dada and Vahini. I had grown up under their love and care. I could not part with them. I knew they would be deeply hurt, though they were very proud and would not at all stand in my way if I wanted it that way!
I tried to find out what my wife thought about it all. In a few days, I collected some gems.
She did not like my house, she did not like my relatives; she did not like to do the chores, she did not like the buffalo. She did not like... she did not like... and there was nobody else’s point of view to consider, according to her. She wanted to make a separate home.
I told Vahini all that my wife had said. She said, “Bhouji, the entire modern generation is like that. They do not want to recognise any ties beyond the immediate ones. Why do you object? Do make a separate establishment. Let us see your modern home at least!” She suddenly stopped and then said, “Bhouji, did you see outside?”
“What?” I asked.
“Your darling wife is eavesdropping.” I already knew that she had this bad habit. I felt ashamed and walked away. My wife looked at Vahini with the expression of a truculent buffalo! Sorry, I should not have likened my wife to a buffalo! But this is a true story!
One day, early in the morning, I saw my wife’s brother coming towards the house. I ran into the house, changed into a loincloth, came out with a broom in my hand and went into the stable. As my brother-in-law came in, I gave a resounding whack on the buffalo’s side and said, “Welcome, welcome, take a seat. I will milk this buffalo and then join you!”
My wife was red with rage. My brother-in-law put his handkerchief to his nose. I laughed boisterously.
My brother-in-law had come to invite his sister. I said, “You ask her! Everyone is free in this house. Your sister does not like anything here. She wants to stay separately. I cannot leave my people — so let her do as she pleases.”
My brother-in-law went away.
Came the night. Prabha asked me, “Will you not talk to me?”
“I do not deserve to talk to you.”
“Why do you say that? I shall do as you wish.”
I didn’t want to carry the quarrel further either.
The storm blew over. Our home did not break up. Throughout all this storm my Vahini’s behaviour was exemplary. Never a hurt — never a sharp edge!
I often wonder, why is it that people who are good, kind, generous, are not the happiest? Is it due to the law of karma? Past life? Life to come? What is it?
Vahini had a son — premature. The nurse brought him before Vahini. So handsome, such bright eyes — bright eyes closed never to open again! Dada wiped a tear and took him away to bury!
Who was he? Why was he born? What was his purpose in life? To Dada and Vahini he was like a piece of alum. Alum, if touched to the eye, clears the eyesight — it also brings tears to the eyes!
He came, hurt them, and went away. They cried and through their tears they saw the same old world lose its colour, sickening their hearts!
Vahini had 2 more such premature babies. Outwardly, she was still her cheerful self. I had a son too. He was more attached to Vahini than to his mother.
That raised another devil in my wife’s mind. “Vahini has an evil eye for my son,” she said. “Is it my fault that her children don’t live? If you want your child to live, please do something about it.”
There were 2 women in front of me — my wife and Vahini. How could I extol womanhood? How could I detest it?
My wife was part of me. If I detested her, it was like detesting myself. She had no thought for others.
“If Vahini picks up baby, she casts an evil eye. Why may the same not happen if I pick up the child?” I asked.
“Our own can never cast an evil eye.”
“Is Vahini not part of us? Why should her eye be evil? Suppose you or I happen to give the child an overdose of opium. Will it stop him from dying?”
“Aha-ha! Look at you! Do what you please but don’t say such horrid things about my baby!” She picked up her son, hugged him and walked away.
Vahini had heard us talking. “What is it, Bhouji?” she asked casually.
I did not stop to think. I told Vahini what had happened. She was deeply hurt.
Being frank does not mean being foolish. My wife may have been foolish but how could I, who called myself, wise carry such poison to Vahini’s ears? Vahini did not seem to notice what I had said. She talked about something else and went away.
In one or two days, I noticed that she was avoiding my son.
Vahini had completely retired within herself. In the afternoons she would sit in her room, doing some work or reading a religious book.
Today she had a heap of rice in front of her on a wooden board. I could see her but she could not see me. She was cleaning the rice and pushing it across the board into the flat winnowing plate. She started singing, then stopped suddenly and watched the pile of rice in front of her sadly. She started again.
It was a devotional song about Himalayas, Ganga, Hardwar!
Some words, some sights have a magic effect on any Hindu mind, howsoever sophisticated. Himalaya and Ganga are some of those words. Gradually they marked a miracle in Vahini’s face. It was as if a wilting flower had been gently sprinkled by the dew of fresh flowers!
Outside the verandah, Bal (my son) heard her voice. He turned round and round to see where it was coming from. He had missed it. He found it again and peeped through the door. There — there was his delight.
Vahini closed the door. Bal started crying and banging on the door. I crept up and gently opened the door without being seen. Bal went in.
Vahini held him away with one hand. She was talking to him. “Go, go, dear one, don’t come near me. Don’t tempt me into your silken snare, darling!”
Bal would not go. At last Vahini lifted him and brought him on the verandah. She put some toys in front him and tried to escape without making him cry.
My wife came there in the meanwhile. Vahini looked at her and went away. Bal cried, he wanted to go to Vahini!
My wife saw me. “Bal has been very sweet these last two or three days, why don’t you play with him a little?” she said.
“No, I may cast an evil eye on him! You carry him yourself,” I said. “I will do the other work.”
“Why do you all hate me and my son so?” she cried.
“Yes, yours is the only child in this world, is it not?” I said in a rage. “Bring him here, you lowborn.” I took Bal, and shouted, “Vahini, Vahini, Vahini, come out at once.”
Vahini came out and asked nervously, “What is it, Bhouji?
There was a painful lump in my throat. I said brokenly “Vahini, mother! Take pity on me. Don’t be cruel to my child! Take him. I talked foolishly Vahini ... promise me...”
“But Bhouji...”
“Don’t utter another word, Vahini, take him first.”
“Bhouji, Bal is with his loved ones! He is happy there! Don’t be so obstinate, Bhouji. I am not destined to be happy. Some people are, and some are not. To tell you the truth, to watch others being happy is also happiness! See how happy he is with you. No — no, rascal — don’t jump on me so. Shall I sing a little song for my baby?” And she sang something.
“Yes, Bal, smile like this, smile but stay with your father.”
I felt more miserable. “Vahini, don’t evade the issue — are you going to take my son or not?”
Vahini did not look at me but said to my wife, “Sister, your son is calling you, carry him around. I will do the work in the house.”
My wife came forward, Vahini started to go. I shouted, “Vahini, don’t take a step forward — I forbid you.” I turned to my wife and said, “Give him to her at once.”
My wife took in the situation, took Bal to Vahini and said softly, “Sister, I am sorry for what I said, take him, please, otherwise I do not know what he will do!”
Vahini took Bal. He was greatly delighted. Vahini showed as if all hurt was forgotten.
There were no further quarrels. When one is not ready for a test, one avoids taking it altogether to save being dubbed a failure! We assiduously avoided situations where disagreement was likely to ensue.
Dada!I have not written much about him. He was never a great talker but since my marriage he had become so silent that sometimes I felt he had gone dumb!
He was never very strong. He was very sensitive and took things to heart. He would go on pining for something vague and unattainable, and no one would know!
Dada should have bloomed when he married Vahini. He had such a jewel for a wife. But he seemed afraid of happiness. He always worried whether he deserved it, and consequently he went about life just listlessly.
My Vahini, on the other hand, was like a honey bee! She would find innocent pleasure in the smallest things of life — and spread it around her. Some people cannot even enjoy happiness found for them by others. They go through life, mere custodians of something. They cannot enjoy, like the police guard round the State Bank, and chafe at it! Dada was like that.
Lately, he had begun to feel that he was going to die soon. He was not ill but he just felt so. Why? Nobody knew!
One day I overheard him talking to Vahini. “If you do not want to suffer after me, you should die now!”
“What do you mean?” “I feel you should die! You should not live after me.”
Vahini laughed and said, “Death is not in one’s hands but if you wish it so, that is how it will happen.”
Time went by. Every now and then, Dada would tell Vahini “to die now.”
One day Vahini replied, “All right, I will die. You tell me when I should die.”
“No, it is not that, but I do feel you should die before me. It does not matter when, but whenever you die, you die before I die,”
“All right,” said Vahini, as if dying were like going to the market!
Such sad winds blew through my house! They were a premonition of disaster.
One day Dada came back with high fever. It turned out to be the serious 9-day fever, usually fatal.
Today was the 9th day. It was about 9 in the morning. Vahini was going for her bath.
I had watched Vahini in the past week. Dada was so serious but Vahini was calm. Her worshipping and prayers went on as usual.
She even said to me, “Bhouji; your brother is so serious but I do not at all feel nervous. Indeed I feel happy and light inside. I even want to be gay. You know the other day I made a garland for my hair from the flowers you had brought for pooja. I feel like a young girl who is playing house, and has come to the end of her play.”
Whose play is going to end, I wondered.
Dada became delirious and started shouting. Vahini came out of her bath in her dipping sari and held him. Dada started raving, “See — see — my devoted wife! My angel! I have been telling her to die, but will she?”
He started a prayer. Then, suddenly, he felt the cold of Vahini’s sari and said, “Why, why are you so wet? ‘Why did you not die? I was asking you for your own good. See now? I am dying and you will be left behind! Are you a pativrata? Are you an angel? Then put your hands on my feet and ... say I will live, say.”
Vahini put her hands on Dada’s feet as in a play and uttered the words. Dada became quiet and went to sleep.
Vahini finished her bath and pooja, and said surprisingly to my wife, “I want to eat with Bhouji today, you serve us.” My wife agreed. We ate happily.
Then she went to sleep and got up late. When she went to Dada, he was perspiring — his temperature was normal!
Vahini laughed to herself contentedly. Dada got well. It was the first day he had gone out a little. I went with him.
When we came back I saw a bed in the spare room. Vahini was down with fever. I called the doctor. Vahini had contracted the 9-day fever!
The fever did not abate. Vahini became thinner and thinner, her voice became stranger and stranger.
“Bhouji, I want to talk to you.”
“Vahini, don’t talk now. The doctor said you must be quiet.”
“Let me say what I want to say. There may not be time afterwards.”
“S-sh-don’t say such things, Vahini.”
“Let it be, Bhouji, listen. You take little things to heart and hurt your wife. You have been like a son to me — remember she has come into your house from a different family. Treat her in a way that she will feel proud of you and our family. After all, she is younger than you — she is bound to make mistakes.”
“Vahini, tell me all this some other time. See I hurt my toe today.”
“Did you apply some ointment?”
“No, not yet.”
“Then go to Prabha and tell her to put some turmeric on it.”
“But you see it first, Vahini.”
“Bhouji, I cannot turn on that side easily.”
“But you touch it at least, Vahini. I shall feel better then.” “Bhouji, what a baby you are still!”
It soon became evident that she was sinking. Dada was sitting near her feet, I near her head. My wife was nursing her.
Vahini wanted to see my son I brought him near her, but he was afraid of her and ran away!
“See Bhouji! He knows. He is already detaching himself from me. I am perspiring, I think.”
Perspiration ran down her as if a rock had sprung forth a stream. My heart beat furiously. I was wiping the perspiration. Vahini asked in an almost inaudible voice, “Is my red mark still there on my forehead?”
“It has been wiped out, I see. I will put it on again. In the meantime, Dada had brought the red kumkum and filled her whole forehead with it (ominously, as they do for dead, married woman who has her husband living).
I could not restrain my sobs. Vahini’s voice sank still further, “Don’t cry near a sick bed — I am going with haldi kumkum in my pallu (end of sari) — why do you cry?” Then she looked at Dada. “Lucky, is it not? It is happening as you wish.” Her voice could be heard no more. Her neck fell to one side. Dada broke into loud sobs.
There was no struggle, no pain, no lingering. Her life went out as a light is blown out by a puff or breeze! She was gone!
Dada kissed her in front of us. And I? I was looking round the room dazedly to see if I could find her soul escaping on delicate wings!
Even if the body is dead, there must be a funeral. This is the funeral of my story.
Vahini’s funeral was performed. The Vahini that I had loved like my mother, we went and burned.
I felt I had once again lost my mother. A desolation descended on our house.
Today was the third day. We went to collect her bones (to be later thrown into the river).
Dada passed his hands gently over the heap of ashes, as if he were caressing his wife’s body. He would pick up a bone. Look at it and throw it into the cloth bag.
At last he came to the wrist bones. They were joined together in salutation, and round them were Vahini’s glass bangles — intact in spite of the fire!
Dada shouted like a mad man, “Bhou, see...see...see this miracle...her bngles, a pativrata’s (an angel’s) bangles! See what it means!” A pativrata’s bangles don't burn.
Dada became practically mad after this. We changed our house.
I went to have a last look at Vahini’s room just before leaving. Written in large red letters in Dada’s hand was the following:
Warning to future tenants!
Angels have left this place!
Only ghosts live here now! Be warned!
And I? Vahini’s bangles have become an obsession with me! Vahini, Vahini, my Vahini’s bangles! I hold them against the light and, as I look, I see in them clearly etched out the figure of my Vahini — like an angel in the stained glass ring — beckoning me, blessing me!
Rationalists, you may have an explanation for this phenomenon! Do not hurt me by giving it to me! I have no use for your rationalisation! Let me remain in my dream world, if dream world it is!
You love someone as dearly as I loved my Vahini and then see...
|
|
TO READ THE COMPLETE ARTICLE SUBSCRIBE WOMAN'S ERA
Available in both PDF & Print format.
|
|
