Mashi

Mashi...
She is the lady who has kept house for my father and me, for the last 18 years; kept my sanity, held me up rock steady when I could easily have been led astray by multiple currents of temptation, and has, in short functioned as more than my mother, never however letting her affection get in the way of executing what she deemed right and righteous.
No formal education, married at the age of 11, disowned at 13, widowed by 30, with two children and five grandchildren, I have gradually learnt to realise and respect the surprisingly liberal, liberated and strong-even if opinionated-person that she is. 'Gradually', because, over the past many years, I've been witness to the storms that have ravaged her ceaselessly, one after the other, and have marvelled at how she has withstood the onslaught, with brave dignity and unruffled courage. Every time. From the news of her husband's second marriage, to dealing with the painful estrangement; to being a single mother working away from home, in strange, often hostile, environments, to leaving her own infant children in the care of others while she herself devoted an entire life in bringing up someone else's.
I've often been pleasantly taken aback by sparks of brilliance, absent or rare even in 'educated' men and women, even though she may occasionally fumble with mathematical tables! Every morning, she meticulously 'reads' the newspaper from cover to cover (a process which involves concentrating with rapt attention at each page, memorising the photographs, and asking me for explanations at particularly intriguing snapshots!); She remembers names and faces (yes, she NEVER forgets the name, face and voice of a 'boy' friend and hardly ever lets the guard of suspicion down!!!); She has a knack for the fine arts so that once introduced to a painting, a movie or a piece of music, she will identify it long long after. And yes, she has a penchnat for all languages, foreign to her mother tongue, be it Hindi, Sanskrit, Englsih or even German(!), and picks up new words-with their correct meanings, mind you(!)-with remarkable alacrity! So that when suitably flustered, she'll say inup-ij-inup in all seriousness, and wont think twice before screaming bloody-basket to a particularly persistent crank-caller on the phone!!!
This lady had fallen out with her mother some time back (to subsequent peaceful reconciliation, of course) and had received the news of the disappearance of her daughter around the same time. And yet, she never let the pall of gloom cast a shadow on our existence, ensuring that it ran as smoothly as ever; She kept the flame of warmth aglow, while maybe it burnt her own heart...Not very long ago, she was re-united with her daughter, and naturally was overwhelmed with affection of a kind that can only accompany the joy of re-discovering a long-lost treasure. But i guess, she is not quite through with proving her mettle to fate or Providence or what have you. Yesterday, on my birthday, probably, the busiest day on her calendar, after slogging single-handedly to feed and entertain my friends from the wee hours, she received the news of the death of her grandchild- her daughter's daughter- just as he was about to retire. Helpless at the sheer physical distance that separated her from her daughter at that moment (who lives in Uttar Pradesh) and the instant cruel reminder to getting back to her chores in less than 8 hours, all she could do was to break down and cry like a child all night.
Today, she was up and at her job as usual, before everyone at home, only her swollen eyes and slightly slackened pace giving away the signs of something amiss. And as i watched her all day,I wondered, how I've let the most insignificant and mundane of things affect and take a toll on me, how I've wallowed in self-pity at the silliest of events, and how in the process, I've let the quiet exemplar of resilience and grit just pass me by...someone who, not knowing her own worth,has never bothered to be didactic, preferring instead, to live a rich full life.
In many ways, Mashi's story is not really unique. There are countless number of women in various pockets of India and the world at large, who have lived such lives. Unnoticed, unceremonious and unpublished in lifestyle magazines sponsored by corporate bigwigs. I write this as an humble ode to these human-beings, these unsung-heroes, whose voices, I am increasingly led to believe, need to be heard on larger platforms.


P.S. Mashi lost her grandchild on the 11th of November, 2009, the day I turned 25. This piece was written the morning after on the 12th.