What couldn’t bring the Manohar family together under one roof, Mukta’s daughter did. The little girl was turning one soon! The last function this family had was Mukta’s welcome as a new bride — a small gathering owing to the pandemic. After three years, her daughter’s big birthday bash was supposed to be their return to the society that taunted and gossiped for giving the reception- that was supposed to follow the wedding — a miss.
In the three years of her married life, red aalta stains weren’t washed away from her memory but they did from the driveway soaked in rain and dried by the sun perennially. The Diwali gwalins, earthen idol and pyalis, earthen pots that she played with filling puffed rice and her brother starting a fire to cook real meals became endless chores that she had promised to fulfil while circling the sacred fire.
Lighting a diya, earthen lamp to ward off evil, her anklet bells jingled against the growing silence of the late evening tiredness. Her mother-in-law had her leave application sanctioned for two weeks; she was ecstatic about spending time with her granddaughter. It was four days until the birthday party. The guests were due to arrive the next morning.
The next morning, the faces after a long night’s journey looked as fresh as jasmines drizzled with morning dew. Shining brighter than the morning sun were the walls now greyish-white. Mukta bowed to touch their feet and took the luggage. As they settled, she poured glasses of water into a tray while setting the saucepan on the stove to start with tea. As the door was left ajar, Manjari mummy, second in line, took a quick peek at the sleeping baby in the darkened room. As her mother-in-law sat with her for a chat, the halwaayi, cook came in with the list of groceries and advance payment.
Weathering tumultuous times for twenty long years since Mukta’s father-in-law passed away, her mother-in-law was looking forward to the birthday party; it would prove her mettle in being financially stable enough to organize a big event sans the man of the house.
She took out her diary to note the expense of the day. Soon more people poured in as the days to the party neared.
“Your father never saved. He never set aside enough money! Don’t follow his path!”, her mother-in-law scolded her husband for overspending on gifts to the relatives on their bidaai, farewell. She carried the trauma of making ends meet with a paltry sum from the clerical job given as remediation from the government. Working her way up, today, she became the manager in a bank; but the struggle of those days bore heavier on her than the lightness of less difficult times now. Her earlier enthusiasm slowly gave way to tiredness in fulfilling the incessant needs of the guests: soaps, shampoo, detergents, an empty tea jar and so on.
Looking for a corner to rest her tired eyes, she felt overwhelmed in the house full of people and chatter. Once on a video call, her puffy face had alarmed Mukta’s husband! She complained of a lack of sleep at night. They had decided on an appointment with the psychiatrist. Now, they were waiting for the birthday party to be over and the guests to clear the house.
Till then, she can’t break, can she? It is still a day to the birthday party. What if the word breaks out? It will be like hitting the honeycomb with a stick. Uncontainable!
The next morning, sorting the red and pink hyacinths in the flower basket for the morning ritual, she asked Mukta to bring rotis, chappati for cows. The first roti is for cows in the morning and the last is for dogs in the evening. The cows in brown and white loitered around the property not yet surrounded by a brick wall. It became a pit stop for cows and municipality wheelbarrows collecting garbage from the Hanuman Path area. It also connected tractors running diagonally to the Vishnu Path. Obsessively ritualistic, she never missed out on the duties of a good Hindu. She hurriedly went running a bath as she had to head out early to an Old Age home for daan and dakshina, donations in the name of her granddaughter. At least, away from home, she wouldn’t be bothered by her upset sleep schedule. While folding clothes, Mukta came across her kurta thinned with years of washing. Threads hung listlessly from the hem, sad and abandoned. These were to make way for wipe cloths for the shelves in the kitchen and dining area. In Hindu households, even the souls of clothes get reincarnated!
On her way back, she had to pick up her blouse from the tailor. It was the day that would decide the fate of her saree selected for the birthday party tomorrow. The tailor had kept his shop shut for three days straight without any prior notice. Adding to her irritation was the domestic help, also shirking. The roar of laughter in the front room did not dim the agitation brewing inside her. The perpetual fatigue of managing domestic affairs wore out the happiness of watching a flower bloom in her garden. Anxious, distracted, sick but not sorry, she could neither hold back her fiery anger nor the stream of tears that followed. She punched the numbers on her phone in repeat mode. Her dilated pupils, hazy with tears, glowed against the torrential verbiage heaped on the cursed Kanchi, the house help.
Mukta’s worried instincts acquired through the years of being a woman, now married required her to get into the kitchen to wash the heap of stacked utensils. She silently beckoned Manjari mummy to hold the baby. She outstretched her hands to hold her reluctant bony fingers. Puzzled, her two moist eyeballs stared at Mukta. No sooner was she taken out for a stroll than her inarticulate cry slipped into oblivion.
Waving her hands at the swarm of flies over sour green and sweet yellow mango peels, languid over-ripe bananas left carelessly to feast the flies, she looked for garbage bags. Here, the wet waste wasn’t separated from the dry but cleared away in polythene bags from grocery shops: a drawback of small cities in preserving good old traditions. Mukta’s modernized kitchen habits went for a toss. As the last bit of running water from the tap splashed on her half-drenched kurta, she wrung the washcloth to clean the kitchen slabs. Uneasily sweaty while mopping the floor, she made her way to run a bath.
Peace settled as she closed the door behind her. She struggled to come out of her wet clothes clinging to her humid body. She doesn’t remember taking a long bath after the baby. At least, with so many people around, she could steal some time for herself to take a good bath. “How will I get ready tomorrow?” she thought. Stepping out, she looked at herself in the mirror. She missed dressing up and getting out. Though minimal, she hasn’t updated her makeup kit for a year or two now. Too caught up in her new responsibilities, she wished for a company she could rely on for the nitty-gritty. I remember my mother wished in me the company that would give her a hand in home skincare and remedies. But I turned out to be minimalistic and basic in my grooming like Mukta.
The sun had set. Mukta’s mother-in-law returned with a smile on her face. Clutching the bag that had her blouse, she posed for a picture with her granddaughter. She too got a red hyacinth clipped on her hair like the baby. The evening was taking a sweeter turn. The birthday party was finally happening and they were ready for it.
ANKITA KUMARI: THE BIRTHDAY PARTY, MAR-APR 2025, MUSE INDIA
image courtesy: firstcryparenting