All of Them Are Cads
A mother’s monologue with her daughter in this story that traces lives of women over generations by Nirupama Dutt
Yes, go on blowing smoke into my face and consider yourself lucky that your father is dead. He was a strange one. All his morals were only for the women of the house. He never exercised these strict standards on himself. And don’t think your husband will stand all your waywardness either. But it does not matter to you, does it? You are independent and can ask him to get lost. At least you can earn for yourself and be happy.
To be independent and happy was not my lot much as I wanted it. Had I been able to earn for myself, I would have bid an early farewell to your father would never arisen. But I was never given a proper education. My brother was sent to a mission school and I to the Arya Putri Pathshala. That too after much thought. Mission schools were ruled out for us girls. They said we would forget our religion and tradition in these schools. As though religion and tradition is meant for girls alone.
And what is tradition after all? Just a whole lot of balderdash. If I had the choice I would have taken up a job and never married. Of course, I would have had a child. You see I always loved children. If I had been ostracized for it, so much the better. In fact I would have taken the lead by putting a sign of my door — “Relatives and dogs not allowed.” For relatives are such a pain. I was married at 23 and in those days it was considered late. I did not care but the relatives were most concerned: “How do your parents sleep at night? “Have they no worry that a hulk of a daughter like you is still unmarried?” This old Parvati was a great one for such talk. I would like to ask her how she sleeps now with her own daughter still unmarried at 32. But now times have changed.
People, however, will always talk whether times change or not. Do you think that must not be talking about your smoking or your refusing to get married? But do I care for them? Not that smoking is any good but if I can’t stop your brothers how can I stop you? Die coughing if you like, and burn your mother’s heart. What do you know of a mother’s love? I know it because I lost my mother when I was not yet eight. Ha! Don’t compare yourself to me by saying you lost your father when you were as old. What is a father’s love? Fiddlestick! If the father dies, the mother takes twice as much care of the children. But a man forgets his children and starts forget his children and starts looking for another wife. I know it because my mother died young.
My mother had to die. She was just 14 when she had her first child and then six more till she died at 31. Only three of us survived. Excessive child-bearing finished half of her and the other half was destroyed by my dear father’s behaviour. Not only did he drink too much, he even went around with other women. Most men are like that and especially he handsome ones. Now, don’t you go about falling for a handsome man. It would be better never to marry. I hate these good-looking men. Didn’t you see the picture of that officer who murdered his wife in such a cold-blooded manner? He is something to look at but see what he did. No, your father was not handsome but was he any better? But at least he did not murder me or pack me off to the grave early. I was the one to see him off. He died of a heart attack. I should have been the one to die of heart trouble considering the shocks he gave me all through my life.
I have indeed become shockproof. Nothing surprises me now. Even you don’t take me unawares when you try to be so modern and liberated. I know full well that you will come back crying to me from what you think has been a massive heart-break. Crying indeed! Save your tears for something better and be happy that you are rid of such rascals. But you won’t listen to me, will you? I am just an old fool of a mother. Why should you learn from my experiences? You have to go through it all yourself. Never mind, you will know one day. Then you will remember your mother as I do mine.
When I recall the little I say of my mother and much more that I heard of her, I wonder at her wisdom. Well, not every realised her worth when she was alive. When she was alive, my grandfather would say: “My son was a diamond but this girl has turned him into coal.” After her death, however, he realised his mistake and knew for himself which was the diamond and which the coal. Then he would weep. All my father’s deeps were discovered when my mother was no longer there to cover up for him. She was the one who kept on good terms with all the relatives. Left to himself my father broke off even with his own father and brother. Only his sister stuck to him till the end but that was because of her own goodness.
You cannot imagine how good-looking my father was. It seems such handsome men are not born any more. Only my sister took after him. He was tall, well-built and his complexion could match that of any British man. When he would come out of his bath, one could see his pink skin through the clinging white kurta. But his temper was like the devil. My sister, brother and I lived in mortal fear of him. We would be fighting like cats but when we heard his voice we would slink away like mice. For if he caught us quarreling, he would scream: “I will send you to separate hostels and then you will not be able to see one another’s faces.”
He did not send us to separate hostels but nevertheless separated us cruelly in his lifetime. Circumstances extended the curse after his death. My sister died in Pakistan and my brother fled from his unhappy youth and settled in England. Yes, we are not able to see one another’s faces. You don’t know how I long she was alive. But my brother is a man after all. He forgot all the love of childhood. He is happy with his wife in England and never a thought for his own sister. No, why should I write to him? A great one you are to ask me to do that. You, who fight with you brothers who love you so much. I will not write to him. If he doesn’t bother to find out whether I am living or dead, why should I? Let him be content with his white woman and half-breed daughter and I am content with my own children. It is a different matter that my children, except the two of you who are not yet married, have no need for me. They are now busy with their own children. This is how life goes on.
Now don’t give me that non-sense about you being different. Let me see you once you are married. But no! Daughters are different. God ble4ss them! Even though I am an old woman I still look with love at the remains of my parental home. My step-mother was step only in name and her two sons mean more to me than my real brother’s. Yes, girls do care more. Look at your elder sister. She was not born of my womb but will anyone say she is my step-daughter? And then look at her brothers. Did I give them any less love? Was I ever a step-mother to them? And now they drag me to the courts at this age. They even grudge me two decent meals a day. The younger one was always strange and the older one could never forgive me for marrying his father. As though I did it out of choice.
You, who make so much of fuss that you won’t marry this one or that one, will never understand that in our days there was no question of choice. Marry the man your father picked for you and be damned. And a fine man my father picked for me. An ageing widower with three children. My father was only interested in getting rid of me, for an unmarried daughter is a burden. My mother was long dead was long dead and my poor step-mother, a village lass, had no say. Why didn’t I say no? You have got into the habit of asking stupid questions. Women were meant to be seen, fondled, cast aside but never to be heard. The only way out would have been to drown myself in the well in our courtyard. I did think of it many times but I couldn’t do it. Anyway now I am glad I am alive.
Life is too good to be cast away for any man. And you better get this into your head. I am shocked at these girls committing suicide because their husbands’ relatives trouble them for not bringing enough dowry or because their husbands treat them badly. Foolish girls. Things are so different today. Must the lives and happiness of girls depend solely on their husbands? Can’t they do anything worth-while with their life rather than just end it? What good is their education? I would like to ask.
Had I been educated well, I would have been a different person. Then I would not have borne all the nonsense of your father or mine. But my father would withdraw me from school at the slightest excuse. Sometimes the school was too far away from our house or my father would be transferred to some village which had no school for girls. Somehow I managed to do my matriculation. I wanted to be a nurse but my father would not hear of it. Nursing, he said, was not a respectable profession. I consoled myself by thinking that one day my daughter would become a nurse. But even that could not be. Nursing is not good enough for her highness.
Ah, don’t give me that rubbish that I wanted to be a nurse just because my brother-in-law was a doctor and in my sub-conscious mind I loved him. True, I loved him but not as you think. He gave me the affection I never got from my own father. I worshipped him and thought him next only to K.L. Saigal. Laugh if you must, but a voice like Saigal’s will not be heard again for a century. And when you try to mimic him in nasal tones, you only degrade yourself. Not jut his singing, his acting was marvelous too. You should have seen him as ‘Devdas’. That is why I still keep his picture. Yes, I have my brother-in-law’s picture too but what is so funny about that? They were both great.
No, I am not contradicting myself when I call them great. When I say I hate men, I mean it. You are always ke4en to prove me wrong. But when you see what I have seen of men, you will know that I couldn’t be more right. Saigal and my brother-in-law, I admire as human beings; I never knew them as men. Ask their wives and you will know what they were really like. You think Saigal’s wife must have been pleased to see him drinking himself to death. And, perhaps, he never used his golden voice to say soothing words to her when she was sad. And my poor sister she was so beautiful but let any woman patient come and my brother-in-law would not let go of her wrist. Pretending to read the pulse, of course. But my brother-in-law gave me a lot of affection. After my mother’s death, I lived for 11 years in my sister’s house and not once was I made to feel an outsider.
In fact, I was an outsider when I went back to my father’s home. He took me back not because he loved me but because people were talking that he is not marrying off his grown-up daughter. So his intentions were simple to get rid of me. Finally, after all that fuss he picked your ‘father’ I did not even murmur a protest. I wanted to be away from my father’s house. I thought of jumping into the well just before the wedding but I did not. It would not have been fair to my mother’s memory or to the sufferings of my step-mother.
Coming from my father’s house to the house of your father was like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. Yes, yes, don’t tell me your father was an intellectual. Actually these intellectuals should never marry. But they do and some like your father marry more than once. I think men like the feeling of leaving a widow who will weep for them. Now I was 17 years younger than your father. He already had three children. The oldest was just five years younger than I. He left home in anger just before our marriage. I don’t blame him. It is not nice to see your balding old father suddenly turning a bridegroom. Anyway, I reconciled myself to fate and decided to be an ideal wife and mother. Not a step-mother, mind you.
But a step-mother can never become a real mother, no matter how hard she tries. The oldest boy ran away from home. The girl was fine. It seemed that she too had been weeping before the marriage saying that she did not want a step-mother. But the moment I into the house, she ran into my arms and called me mother. The youngest boy though only 10 was quite a complex character. He was all right when he was alone with me but he could not beat to see me with his father. You know he slept with us even on our wedding night. But I was glad for it. It would not have been much of a night for you know what present that intellectual father of yours gave me on the first night? He brought me a copy of the ‘The Taming of the Shrew’.
Well, taming is too mild a word for what happened in the months to follow. I felt sad that the elder boy should have left the house just because of me, so I went and brought him back like a great mother would have. I thought it would please your father that his 18 year-old innocent son was back. But may your father’s soul rest in peace, he started accusing me of having illicit relations with his first-born.
A woman has to walk through fire all her life. Why did I tolerate it? Well, what else could I do? I had no job to fall back on. And when a girl left her father’s house, she was told that she was to remain in her husband’s house till she died, come what may. I stood it all, but I could never forget the humiliation. True, he cared for me in his own fashion. He would buy me expensive presents but he would also leave me with a child every other year. If men could do it they would keep a woman perpetually pregnant so that they could be free for their philandering. Yes, even then there were ways of birth control but your father would not hear of them. I aborted myself twice but I could not make abortions a habit. I bore four sons and two daughters.
Children are indeed a blessing I forgot all my sorrows bringing up all of you. I did all that I could do for my children. I am not the only one. All mothers are like this. But children are different. They need you only when they are small. Look at my own sons. What am I to them? They are so busy with their lives and wives that they don’t get time even to drop a line to their mother for months together. Now don’t laugh at the tears in my eves. I am not contradicting myself by crying. I am not crying for men but for my sons, who are my flesh and blood. But then they are men too. And it is foolish to expect any consideration from men — all of them are cads!
_______
A mother’s monologue with her daughter in this story that traces lives of women over generations by Nirupama Dutt
Yes, go on blowing smoke into my face and consider yourself lucky that your father is dead. He was a strange one. All his morals were only for the women of the house. He never exercised these strict standards on himself. And don’t think your husband will stand all your waywardness either. But it does not matter to you, does it? You are independent and can ask him to get lost. At least you can earn for yourself and be happy.
To be independent and happy was not my lot much as I wanted it. Had I been able to earn for myself, I would have bid an early farewell to your father would never arisen. But I was never given a proper education. My brother was sent to a mission school and I to the Arya Putri Pathshala. That too after much thought. Mission schools were ruled out for us girls. They said we would forget our religion and tradition in these schools. As though religion and tradition is meant for girls alone.
And what is tradition after all? Just a whole lot of balderdash. If I had the choice I would have taken up a job and never married. Of course, I would have had a child. You see I always loved children. If I had been ostracized for it, so much the better. In fact I would have taken the lead by putting a sign of my door — “Relatives and dogs not allowed.” For relatives are such a pain. I was married at 23 and in those days it was considered late. I did not care but the relatives were most concerned: “How do your parents sleep at night? “Have they no worry that a hulk of a daughter like you is still unmarried?” This old Parvati was a great one for such talk. I would like to ask her how she sleeps now with her own daughter still unmarried at 32. But now times have changed.
People, however, will always talk whether times change or not. Do you think that must not be talking about your smoking or your refusing to get married? But do I care for them? Not that smoking is any good but if I can’t stop your brothers how can I stop you? Die coughing if you like, and burn your mother’s heart. What do you know of a mother’s love? I know it because I lost my mother when I was not yet eight. Ha! Don’t compare yourself to me by saying you lost your father when you were as old. What is a father’s love? Fiddlestick! If the father dies, the mother takes twice as much care of the children. But a man forgets his children and starts forget his children and starts looking for another wife. I know it because my mother died young.
My mother had to die. She was just 14 when she had her first child and then six more till she died at 31. Only three of us survived. Excessive child-bearing finished half of her and the other half was destroyed by my dear father’s behaviour. Not only did he drink too much, he even went around with other women. Most men are like that and especially he handsome ones. Now, don’t you go about falling for a handsome man. It would be better never to marry. I hate these good-looking men. Didn’t you see the picture of that officer who murdered his wife in such a cold-blooded manner? He is something to look at but see what he did. No, your father was not handsome but was he any better? But at least he did not murder me or pack me off to the grave early. I was the one to see him off. He died of a heart attack. I should have been the one to die of heart trouble considering the shocks he gave me all through my life.
I have indeed become shockproof. Nothing surprises me now. Even you don’t take me unawares when you try to be so modern and liberated. I know full well that you will come back crying to me from what you think has been a massive heart-break. Crying indeed! Save your tears for something better and be happy that you are rid of such rascals. But you won’t listen to me, will you? I am just an old fool of a mother. Why should you learn from my experiences? You have to go through it all yourself. Never mind, you will know one day. Then you will remember your mother as I do mine.
When I recall the little I say of my mother and much more that I heard of her, I wonder at her wisdom. Well, not every realised her worth when she was alive. When she was alive, my grandfather would say: “My son was a diamond but this girl has turned him into coal.” After her death, however, he realised his mistake and knew for himself which was the diamond and which the coal. Then he would weep. All my father’s deeps were discovered when my mother was no longer there to cover up for him. She was the one who kept on good terms with all the relatives. Left to himself my father broke off even with his own father and brother. Only his sister stuck to him till the end but that was because of her own goodness.
You cannot imagine how good-looking my father was. It seems such handsome men are not born any more. Only my sister took after him. He was tall, well-built and his complexion could match that of any British man. When he would come out of his bath, one could see his pink skin through the clinging white kurta. But his temper was like the devil. My sister, brother and I lived in mortal fear of him. We would be fighting like cats but when we heard his voice we would slink away like mice. For if he caught us quarreling, he would scream: “I will send you to separate hostels and then you will not be able to see one another’s faces.”
He did not send us to separate hostels but nevertheless separated us cruelly in his lifetime. Circumstances extended the curse after his death. My sister died in Pakistan and my brother fled from his unhappy youth and settled in England. Yes, we are not able to see one another’s faces. You don’t know how I long she was alive. But my brother is a man after all. He forgot all the love of childhood. He is happy with his wife in England and never a thought for his own sister. No, why should I write to him? A great one you are to ask me to do that. You, who fight with you brothers who love you so much. I will not write to him. If he doesn’t bother to find out whether I am living or dead, why should I? Let him be content with his white woman and half-breed daughter and I am content with my own children. It is a different matter that my children, except the two of you who are not yet married, have no need for me. They are now busy with their own children. This is how life goes on.
Now don’t give me that non-sense about you being different. Let me see you once you are married. But no! Daughters are different. God ble4ss them! Even though I am an old woman I still look with love at the remains of my parental home. My step-mother was step only in name and her two sons mean more to me than my real brother’s. Yes, girls do care more. Look at your elder sister. She was not born of my womb but will anyone say she is my step-daughter? And then look at her brothers. Did I give them any less love? Was I ever a step-mother to them? And now they drag me to the courts at this age. They even grudge me two decent meals a day. The younger one was always strange and the older one could never forgive me for marrying his father. As though I did it out of choice.
You, who make so much of fuss that you won’t marry this one or that one, will never understand that in our days there was no question of choice. Marry the man your father picked for you and be damned. And a fine man my father picked for me. An ageing widower with three children. My father was only interested in getting rid of me, for an unmarried daughter is a burden. My mother was long dead was long dead and my poor step-mother, a village lass, had no say. Why didn’t I say no? You have got into the habit of asking stupid questions. Women were meant to be seen, fondled, cast aside but never to be heard. The only way out would have been to drown myself in the well in our courtyard. I did think of it many times but I couldn’t do it. Anyway now I am glad I am alive.
Life is too good to be cast away for any man. And you better get this into your head. I am shocked at these girls committing suicide because their husbands’ relatives trouble them for not bringing enough dowry or because their husbands treat them badly. Foolish girls. Things are so different today. Must the lives and happiness of girls depend solely on their husbands? Can’t they do anything worth-while with their life rather than just end it? What good is their education? I would like to ask.
Had I been educated well, I would have been a different person. Then I would not have borne all the nonsense of your father or mine. But my father would withdraw me from school at the slightest excuse. Sometimes the school was too far away from our house or my father would be transferred to some village which had no school for girls. Somehow I managed to do my matriculation. I wanted to be a nurse but my father would not hear of it. Nursing, he said, was not a respectable profession. I consoled myself by thinking that one day my daughter would become a nurse. But even that could not be. Nursing is not good enough for her highness.
Ah, don’t give me that rubbish that I wanted to be a nurse just because my brother-in-law was a doctor and in my sub-conscious mind I loved him. True, I loved him but not as you think. He gave me the affection I never got from my own father. I worshipped him and thought him next only to K.L. Saigal. Laugh if you must, but a voice like Saigal’s will not be heard again for a century. And when you try to mimic him in nasal tones, you only degrade yourself. Not jut his singing, his acting was marvelous too. You should have seen him as ‘Devdas’. That is why I still keep his picture. Yes, I have my brother-in-law’s picture too but what is so funny about that? They were both great.
No, I am not contradicting myself when I call them great. When I say I hate men, I mean it. You are always ke4en to prove me wrong. But when you see what I have seen of men, you will know that I couldn’t be more right. Saigal and my brother-in-law, I admire as human beings; I never knew them as men. Ask their wives and you will know what they were really like. You think Saigal’s wife must have been pleased to see him drinking himself to death. And, perhaps, he never used his golden voice to say soothing words to her when she was sad. And my poor sister she was so beautiful but let any woman patient come and my brother-in-law would not let go of her wrist. Pretending to read the pulse, of course. But my brother-in-law gave me a lot of affection. After my mother’s death, I lived for 11 years in my sister’s house and not once was I made to feel an outsider.
In fact, I was an outsider when I went back to my father’s home. He took me back not because he loved me but because people were talking that he is not marrying off his grown-up daughter. So his intentions were simple to get rid of me. Finally, after all that fuss he picked your ‘father’ I did not even murmur a protest. I wanted to be away from my father’s house. I thought of jumping into the well just before the wedding but I did not. It would not have been fair to my mother’s memory or to the sufferings of my step-mother.
Coming from my father’s house to the house of your father was like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. Yes, yes, don’t tell me your father was an intellectual. Actually these intellectuals should never marry. But they do and some like your father marry more than once. I think men like the feeling of leaving a widow who will weep for them. Now I was 17 years younger than your father. He already had three children. The oldest was just five years younger than I. He left home in anger just before our marriage. I don’t blame him. It is not nice to see your balding old father suddenly turning a bridegroom. Anyway, I reconciled myself to fate and decided to be an ideal wife and mother. Not a step-mother, mind you.
But a step-mother can never become a real mother, no matter how hard she tries. The oldest boy ran away from home. The girl was fine. It seemed that she too had been weeping before the marriage saying that she did not want a step-mother. But the moment I into the house, she ran into my arms and called me mother. The youngest boy though only 10 was quite a complex character. He was all right when he was alone with me but he could not beat to see me with his father. You know he slept with us even on our wedding night. But I was glad for it. It would not have been much of a night for you know what present that intellectual father of yours gave me on the first night? He brought me a copy of the ‘The Taming of the Shrew’.
Well, taming is too mild a word for what happened in the months to follow. I felt sad that the elder boy should have left the house just because of me, so I went and brought him back like a great mother would have. I thought it would please your father that his 18 year-old innocent son was back. But may your father’s soul rest in peace, he started accusing me of having illicit relations with his first-born.
A woman has to walk through fire all her life. Why did I tolerate it? Well, what else could I do? I had no job to fall back on. And when a girl left her father’s house, she was told that she was to remain in her husband’s house till she died, come what may. I stood it all, but I could never forget the humiliation. True, he cared for me in his own fashion. He would buy me expensive presents but he would also leave me with a child every other year. If men could do it they would keep a woman perpetually pregnant so that they could be free for their philandering. Yes, even then there were ways of birth control but your father would not hear of them. I aborted myself twice but I could not make abortions a habit. I bore four sons and two daughters.
Children are indeed a blessing I forgot all my sorrows bringing up all of you. I did all that I could do for my children. I am not the only one. All mothers are like this. But children are different. They need you only when they are small. Look at my own sons. What am I to them? They are so busy with their lives and wives that they don’t get time even to drop a line to their mother for months together. Now don’t laugh at the tears in my eves. I am not contradicting myself by crying. I am not crying for men but for my sons, who are my flesh and blood. But then they are men too. And it is foolish to expect any consideration from men — all of them are cads!
_______
