Fear thy neighbor!

Rewind to the ‘born again house-wife’ …. Bet u’re expecting the clichéd ‘they lived happily ever after’!

So did I …what I didn’t reckon for was the mother-in-law of modern times, ‘the Neighbor’!!!

There I was, doing the dance of freedom in the solitude of my sanctum-sanctorum, gleefully contemplating all the delightful options which lay ahead of me, when the ringing of the door bell rudely interrupted my party for one! I gingerly opened the door to find my neighbor, sari clad, in contrast to my disgraceful and shabby house-coat, grimly surveying the unpleasant scene, which included yours truly, in front of her uncompromising eyes … loud music, newspaper strewn all over, and the floor was still shuddering from the shock of having this tub of lard (me again, I mean, I am the heroine if u please!!) unceremoniously boogying all over it’s prettily mosaic-ed surface!!! The aroma of my coffee battled with the smell of sambhar, curry … in other words, a four course meal. Help, this paragon of virtue had apparently finished cooking lunch, showering, donning a sari, done her Pooja, and there I was in disgraceful contrast, the slob whose day had not even begun!!

She briskly walked in and started folding up the paper. She expressed her disapproval of the unholy music I was vulgarly listening to and informed that at my age (huh?!), and at this hour, devotional music would be more suitable!! By now I was all humiliated and shriveled up. While there was nothing I could do about my appearance (I had new found appreciation for Ashok who has seen the worst as far as I am concerned and is still so gung-ho about life!), I resorted to one of the seven deadly sins and lied about wrapping up my cooking! Quick thinking, which got me a glimmer of a smile!

She departed with the ominous warning that she would be back the next day with some religious tapes. I longingly thought of my unfeeling and cold boss who hadn’t given a dam about anything, except sales targets being achieved! How I missed her indifference!!!

Like a pricked balloon I crawled back to my now cold coffee, the primly folded newspaper, & tried to revive the party, when my bruised ego was rudely shaken up by the firm ringing of the door-bell – AGAIN!!!!

A young thing tripped in with baby and bag in tow – apparently news about me quitting the big bad working world had spread like wildfire! She gaily announced that since I loved kids, from now on, I would get to spend quality time (?) with hers … didn’t she realize that the rotten human being that I was, I had many times prayed for a fast-forward button to propel my kid to the school going stage and me to ‘aazaadi’??!!

I had barely digested this when with the milk of human kindness dripping from her, neighbor 2 informed me that she would wait while I got ready, and that we could start a routine of going vegetable shopping regularly!!!

What about all those frozen veggies lying lovingly in my freezer – wouldn’t their feelings be hurt?!

I was finally enlightened – u either trot of to an office or any work place, or u cook fresh healthy food for your family all day long!!! Apparently, the world had no place for alien gals like me who just wanna have fun and fritter their lives away!! I almost thought a space-ship would descend and whisk me away to ‘planet waste ’!!

Hang modesty!! Till this very hour, I was pretty pleased with the way I had turned out. In fact probably the reason I was so huge was that it was worth having many of me!! But now, like Dickens “Uriah Heep”, I was truly humbled!!

I was no match for her and dutifully did the rounds of the vegetable shops and came back with bags bursting with veggies, some whose names I didn’t know, but didn’t have the guts to reveal my ignorance.

Back home, I sat in a stupor totally stripped of all hope and energy. Enter neighbor 3 – I distraughtly asked her if she’d like a cup of coffee to which she primly answered that she didn’t partake of such poisons!! Meaning I was a ‘vish-kanya’!!! I tried to lighten my mood by imagining myself in a ‘nagin’ attire, a la Sridevi or Reena Roy!! Not for long, because if I had hoped third time lucky, definitely not!! When I made small talk about hitting the gym, now that I had the time, she looked contemptuously at me, and pompously told me to sack my house-boy (who was my true Knight in shining armor, sorry Ashok!!) and get down to doing my own house-work as a fitness routine!!

So there I was at the end of the day, broken, shattered, and the exhaustion, more than I would have experienced after the toughest of days at work!!

Happy to report that from that state of total despair, emerged a plan to deal with this menace:

*Learnt to remove my foot-wear & sneak in and outta the house so that I couldn’t be accosted by my friendly (?) neighbor! Ditto in the house – dirty, cold feet were a small price to pay for the bliss of privacy and debauchery!!

*Invested in ear-phones – to secretly indulge in my vulgar unrefined music!!

*My desperation was like a beacon light which guided me to a soul-sister, Neha. We bonded in our indignation and outrage at the expectations of our nosey neighbors, over many cups of over-sweetened, milky tea!! Shades of oppressed daughters-in-law, who group together to discuss their mothers-in-law!

*Your neighbor – the new age mother-in-law!!

*Moral with a twist - 'fear thy neighbour'!!