“He is finally leaving and I am so glad about it” exclaimed my dear friend Anita, at the breakfast table today.
Anita is a very close friend and also a former colleague of mine. We sit in the same office building, but different floors. We have breakfast, lunch and evening tea together. We have bonded well over the years and we share our worries and tensions and also all the happy moments in our lives. So, I got curious at her remark and asked her to whom was she referring and with whose departure, she was so happy!
I am talking about my father-in-law Sheetal, Anita said.
I was surprised to see Anita talk like this. She is a very homely person and she loves having people around and talking to them and why was she suddenly wanting to get rid of good old man, I wondered.
Anita: Don’t ask Sheetal. Past week was hell for me in my own house. That person is no good to anyone. He was sitting like a loner with a cracked face all the time during the Ganesha celebrations. He won’t speak with us or talk to us. We were acting as there was some stranger in the house.
Me: Just like that? Out of the blue, he wasn’t talking to you all in the house?
Anita: Yeah, just like that. He and his fancy mood swings. He didn’t utter a word about anything that was bothering him (if at all??!!). How are we supposed to know what is bothering him or troubling him? Shouldn’t he open his mouth to at least tell us if something is bothering him? Is he in some jungle or some unknown place where he can’t share his feelings?
Me: Calm down, Anita. He must be a shy person and thinking of not bothering you with small things.
Anita: Sheetal, you tell me how does it feel in a house with 4 people, where one person is sitting with a cringed and fallen face, he won’t see you in the eye, he won’t talk, won’t eat food, which you have prepared for him. How will you feel in your own house? I was feeling so suffocated with his whimsical behavior of his. I thought of running away from my own house, where I love spending time and being there.
Me: Yes, I understand. Didn’t your husband or mother-in-law talk to him or ask him, what he is up to?
Anita: My mother-in-law has spent her entire life with this man and I really salute her for this. I do not know how she stayed with him all these years. She knows all his so-called “tamashas” and keeps mum and does her own thing. She has accepted now, that he is like that only. It requires a lot of guts to carry on like this with a person with whom we almost share nothing. Definitively, she has tried to persuade him to lead a good, enriching and fulfilling life. He could do some social service or teach students or talk to the senior citizens of his age during morning or evening walks. But no, everybody in the world except him is wrong and bad. So, I think, she has now given up on him as one can’t do much if the other party is not interested. He taught all his life in a school and I wonder was this he learned his life and taught his students? How to create problems out of nothing?
Me: What are you saying? He was a teacher and still this immaturity?
Anita: Yes, see, he was the youngest amongst his siblings and I think he never grew up. He still thinks elders should treat him like a child and all younger people should give him the due respect.
Me: How can he expect that? He can’t command respect like this. He has to earn it and be worthy of it.
Anita: Exactly, these are my very words. Not once did he utter a word about our newly furnished house. Not once did he ask me about my health or asked me about how I manage to deck up the house alone in my husband’s absence? Would you think of inviting him next time to see his sullen face?
Me: Really? He didn’t say anything about your new house?
Anita: Yeah, not a single word of appreciation or support! He has a wonderful wife, 2 dutiful sons, to whom he could never get close due to this strange behavior of his and leave me. I am not even close to becoming his daughter and can never be his daughter. After all in-laws can never be parents. It is only for the heck of saying it at the time of wedding that we are not taking home a daughter-in-law, but a daughter.
Me: yeah, I agree Anita. This relationship is such that it is a little complicated. You can never really get close to your in-laws like your parents. Even if you become a mother-in-law to someone in future, it would be the same, I think!
Anita: No way, I would take care not to repeat the mistakes which my in-laws have done and I will see to it that whenever we all are together, I won’t spoil their happiness on their big days or during festivities. And I really hope that we don’t cross each other’s paths and spoil each other’s happiness in future again!
Me: This is a bit too much Anita. Time will lessen your anger and pain. Looks like you have closed all the doors on him.
Me: Yeah, I have. Is there any use of hoping something from him after 60 years of his stubborn behavior? Expecting a change in him is itself wrong on my part!
We closed the conversation on not so healthy note.
Her anguish, sadness and negativity towards her father-in-law made me ponder.
What goes into such people’s head? What is wrong with her father-in-law? Why had he come all the way here and spoiled the atmosphere at their new house when there were festivities around? I couldn’t imagine Anita wanting to get out of her own house because of his negative attitude. I have known Anita and she is extremely sensitive person. For her to say all this, she must really have suffered a lot in the past few days. She couldn’t tell her husband and mother-in-law as they just advised her to ignore him by laughing it off. It was common for them to see him sad like this, but for her it was unbearable.
I just came to one conclusion by thinking about her father-in-law. He doesn’t have it in his destiny to enjoy good things. He is destined to be a loner; he has some things from his past birth to settle in his birth perhaps. Why would he have to stay alone in his house, which he built for his sons and which his sons hardly like. He built it according to his own wish, without consulting his wife or sons. Now he has to sit and guard his house, all alone.
I very much believe that even for enjoying good things, you have to have that correct and positive attitude in life or else even the biggest happiness in life doesn’t mean anything to you..
I felt happy for Anita that now at least she would be in peace with herself and hope that her father-in-law also finds peace sometime in his life!
Anita is a very close friend and also a former colleague of mine. We sit in the same office building, but different floors. We have breakfast, lunch and evening tea together. We have bonded well over the years and we share our worries and tensions and also all the happy moments in our lives. So, I got curious at her remark and asked her to whom was she referring and with whose departure, she was so happy!
I am talking about my father-in-law Sheetal, Anita said.
I was surprised to see Anita talk like this. She is a very homely person and she loves having people around and talking to them and why was she suddenly wanting to get rid of good old man, I wondered.
Anita: Don’t ask Sheetal. Past week was hell for me in my own house. That person is no good to anyone. He was sitting like a loner with a cracked face all the time during the Ganesha celebrations. He won’t speak with us or talk to us. We were acting as there was some stranger in the house.
Me: Just like that? Out of the blue, he wasn’t talking to you all in the house?
Anita: Yeah, just like that. He and his fancy mood swings. He didn’t utter a word about anything that was bothering him (if at all??!!). How are we supposed to know what is bothering him or troubling him? Shouldn’t he open his mouth to at least tell us if something is bothering him? Is he in some jungle or some unknown place where he can’t share his feelings?
Me: Calm down, Anita. He must be a shy person and thinking of not bothering you with small things.
Anita: Sheetal, you tell me how does it feel in a house with 4 people, where one person is sitting with a cringed and fallen face, he won’t see you in the eye, he won’t talk, won’t eat food, which you have prepared for him. How will you feel in your own house? I was feeling so suffocated with his whimsical behavior of his. I thought of running away from my own house, where I love spending time and being there.
Me: Yes, I understand. Didn’t your husband or mother-in-law talk to him or ask him, what he is up to?
Anita: My mother-in-law has spent her entire life with this man and I really salute her for this. I do not know how she stayed with him all these years. She knows all his so-called “tamashas” and keeps mum and does her own thing. She has accepted now, that he is like that only. It requires a lot of guts to carry on like this with a person with whom we almost share nothing. Definitively, she has tried to persuade him to lead a good, enriching and fulfilling life. He could do some social service or teach students or talk to the senior citizens of his age during morning or evening walks. But no, everybody in the world except him is wrong and bad. So, I think, she has now given up on him as one can’t do much if the other party is not interested. He taught all his life in a school and I wonder was this he learned his life and taught his students? How to create problems out of nothing?
Me: What are you saying? He was a teacher and still this immaturity?
Anita: Yes, see, he was the youngest amongst his siblings and I think he never grew up. He still thinks elders should treat him like a child and all younger people should give him the due respect.
Me: How can he expect that? He can’t command respect like this. He has to earn it and be worthy of it.
Anita: Exactly, these are my very words. Not once did he utter a word about our newly furnished house. Not once did he ask me about my health or asked me about how I manage to deck up the house alone in my husband’s absence? Would you think of inviting him next time to see his sullen face?
Me: Really? He didn’t say anything about your new house?
Anita: Yeah, not a single word of appreciation or support! He has a wonderful wife, 2 dutiful sons, to whom he could never get close due to this strange behavior of his and leave me. I am not even close to becoming his daughter and can never be his daughter. After all in-laws can never be parents. It is only for the heck of saying it at the time of wedding that we are not taking home a daughter-in-law, but a daughter.
Me: yeah, I agree Anita. This relationship is such that it is a little complicated. You can never really get close to your in-laws like your parents. Even if you become a mother-in-law to someone in future, it would be the same, I think!
Anita: No way, I would take care not to repeat the mistakes which my in-laws have done and I will see to it that whenever we all are together, I won’t spoil their happiness on their big days or during festivities. And I really hope that we don’t cross each other’s paths and spoil each other’s happiness in future again!
Me: This is a bit too much Anita. Time will lessen your anger and pain. Looks like you have closed all the doors on him.
Me: Yeah, I have. Is there any use of hoping something from him after 60 years of his stubborn behavior? Expecting a change in him is itself wrong on my part!
We closed the conversation on not so healthy note.
Her anguish, sadness and negativity towards her father-in-law made me ponder.
What goes into such people’s head? What is wrong with her father-in-law? Why had he come all the way here and spoiled the atmosphere at their new house when there were festivities around? I couldn’t imagine Anita wanting to get out of her own house because of his negative attitude. I have known Anita and she is extremely sensitive person. For her to say all this, she must really have suffered a lot in the past few days. She couldn’t tell her husband and mother-in-law as they just advised her to ignore him by laughing it off. It was common for them to see him sad like this, but for her it was unbearable.
I just came to one conclusion by thinking about her father-in-law. He doesn’t have it in his destiny to enjoy good things. He is destined to be a loner; he has some things from his past birth to settle in his birth perhaps. Why would he have to stay alone in his house, which he built for his sons and which his sons hardly like. He built it according to his own wish, without consulting his wife or sons. Now he has to sit and guard his house, all alone.
I very much believe that even for enjoying good things, you have to have that correct and positive attitude in life or else even the biggest happiness in life doesn’t mean anything to you..
I felt happy for Anita that now at least she would be in peace with herself and hope that her father-in-law also finds peace sometime in his life!
2 comments:
I just read your short story and felt bad for Anita. I understand how it feels when there is an intent to be in festive mood and enjoy the festival but because one person is not co-operative, the intent just stays as intent. Festive days are to have fun with family and friends and it’s enjoyable only when everyone participates in it. Well, Anita’s happiness at her FIL’s departure might sound as if she is a bad DIL, but then after all she is a human being and she would expect something from everyone and when the expectations are not fulfilled she would get upset and disappointed. Said that she should also start being not bothered by her father in law’s attitude. It’s been 60 yrs that he has been like that and it’s not possible and unfair to expect him to change. He seems happy being a loner and others should be happy letting him be happy the way he wants.
wht to say...i know kahi manse vikshipt astat....there r two types of dealing with it....accept the person as it is n make adjustment n live ur life along by ignoring the irritating habits or just letting it go and the other way is taking your separate path very early in your life coz u dont want to adjust in each phase n step of ur life, dont want to do the sacrifices which are not relevant....
i guess ur frnd's mom in law chose the first options which many partners of the married couple in india do n just carry on with ur life....
arrange marriage is a gamble... if u wish to play it, try to stick to it...thts the teaching n coaching we get since childhood....
for ur frnd...she has been tied in a life long relation with him...she cant ignore the fact tht he is her father in law...so now she has to decide how she wants to accept him....thts it....total rejection even if she wants, is not possible as she will end up losing n hurting some more people with it....
of couse my point of view....:)
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