Eyes that tell stories

 When I saw her I had an instant liking for her. She was accompanying her daughter for a gynecological checkup. While the women chattered, waiting for their turn to come, she was quiet. She wasn’t scared but quiet. She would contribute to the gossip occasionally, breaking the silent spell that seemed to have been cast on her. My imagination was bound by my stereotypical mind and I tried to piece out her story in my mind. She was obviously from the slums of Kathputli Colony this health check up camp catered to. She has work to get back to, chores to complete, at least 5-7 kids to take care of, I thought to myself. Then she smiled at me and I knew I had her approval. So I went ahead and asked her, ‘aapke kitne bache hain?’, ‘Five girls and three boys’ she replied. Then she enquired about what I do. When she learnt that I was just a college student, she started telling me about her daughters. One of her daughters had studied till class 10. I could see that she was proud. And then I knew that like every other mother, she had dreams for her daughters too. Dreams that, she somehow knew would remain unfulfilled, but yet she dreamt them. Maybe they lent her a sense of comfort.  She continued talking about her daughters. Another is 19 and pregnant with her second baby. She was waiting in the line for her check up. She told me about her daughter who studies in class 4. We had nothing in common. I failed to understand why she wanted me to know all of this at that point, yet I listened because I wanted to know. Then I asked her if she would let her daughter who is in class 4 finish her schooling. She laughed and said that her daughter would get married before that. She asked me when I plan to get married. I blushed and told her, ‘not any time soon’. I told her that normally, girls these days don’t get married before 24. She was astounded and couldn’t resist laughing. I wondered if what I had told her was really that amusing. 

Then the revelation came. Even though she fostered dreams for her daughters, it wasn’t just the society she lived in that was holding her back, but she was holding herself back too. She had dreams for her daughters, but her reality overpowered them. I told her how important education is. She nodded and smiled. But her smile, told me that she understood me, but she also knew that I wouldn’t understand her world. We live in the same city, but we come from two different worlds. And my world started to seem far simpler when compared to hers. Maybe it’s foolish to compare our lives. What do I know about her life? Our situation was similar to one where a blind person attempts at directing a lost person. I was blind to her problems. And she’d rather try her luck than take directions from me. This is a very strange characteristic of mankind or at least mine - if am not in touch with the reality I assume that things are easy to fix. But then they say - reality is stranger than fiction. There was no dissatisfaction in her eyes, rather she seemed content. She didn’t tell me but I knew that she had done as much as she could for her daughters. So I decided to give her the credit for that and say no more.



- Jyotsna Mahajan