Having discovered the independence that comes with shifting from the passenger seat in the car to the driver's, my wife is always insisting on running errands she would have scoffed at earlier. This morning, she told me she intended to drive 25 km simply to pay an insurance premium. "Listen," I suggested, "why don't you get yourself a job: that way, you won't have the time to keep running to the market to buy things we don't need." "If I go to work," she said, "who's going to teach the kids?" Because I was leaving for work, I didn't think it was a good time to remind her that our son had scored his poorest ever marks in the tests that coincided, remarkably, with her quitting her last job. It wasn't always so. A year after we were married, my wife said, "I hope you don't think I'm a weak-kneed, weak-spined, parasitic woman. I refuse to be one of those society ladies who lunch. I intend to do something with my life. I will get myself a job."
A week later she said, "To be on a wage, to be at someone's beck and call, to be told by somebody else to do what has to be done, reflects the mentality of a slave. I will not work in bondage for anybody, I will open my own boutique."
She went around Hauz Khas Village and Santushti and saw what the designer stores stocked, and decided that her shop would have everything all the other shops had. "But that way you will have no specialty," I protested. "I'm not asking you for any help, so I don't think you should advise me," she answered.
I sold my computer to pay the advance rent on the shop. The airconditioner went to pay for its painting and shelving. I took a loan so she could stock the linen and antique furniture she wanted to sell, and pick up the export-surplus garments by weight from the weekly pavement vendor.
On the day the shop opened, my wife came home in tears. "Sarla's mother came and bought four dresses, and told the driver to take them to the car. Then when I told her the bill was two thousand rupees, she gave me only eight hundred rupees and said I must not make a profit from friends. I'll never speak to Sarla again." The first week was a record of sorts. Besides Sarla, my wife stopped speaking to Mukta, the Chatterjees, Kanta, Padmini, Mohini, Meena, Priya, Mani, Bina, Kim, and the dhobi's wife. She said her salesgirl was rude to her. She said the owner of Eyes On You was stealing her designs. She swore Mrs Ahuja of Heart's Delight was paying touts to take away her customers. In the second week she said she was neglecting her house. She said, "I feel so terrible when you come back tired to an empty house. We got married so that I could look after you."
In the third week she said, "Basically I'm a man's woman, and I believe a woman's place is at home." She told her friends that she had taken the decision to close shop because I couldn't manage without a 24-hour wife looking after me. She gave gifts of bedcovers to all the friends she had fought with. Antique finished furniture went by truck to friends she had schooled with in Calcutta. She told the dhobi's wife to take away all the export-surplus garments. I sold my second-hand car to buy back the second-hand airconditioner. Two silver platters paid for the computer. I'm still repaying the loan. In hindsight, maybe we're all better off with her behind the wheel.
