The World Of Angels

I wanted to post this on Sunday, but all my desperate attempts went in vain thanks to the long Saturday night out and Sunday engagements. I really made it a point to post this in time which I rarely do for other posts. Apologies to my good self.

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A small baby…a cute little girl…an obedient daughter…a supporting sister…an well-behaved and faithful wife…a never-complaining and ever-sacrificing mother…and somebody’s aunt and somebody’s in-law and so on.

Hmm…Well, a boy also goes through many different phases in his life. But, as a 25-year old guy in this male-dominated society (yes, we still are); I would have to admit the fact that a girl spends her life with more contentment than her counterpart. This has been a norm, a fact & such a truth that I often wonder but agree. We got to accept it, realize it & acknowledge it, sooner…the better. Life starts and it moves on, so fast that we forget to ask our closed ones few simple yet important questions. We ask them "are you okay" instead of "are you really happy"…we say them the dinner was good instead of has she ate at all...We have always been indifferent towards her. We say we care for her, but there are moments when she needs us and we must be there with her in those moments.

What makes me worried more is that after so many years of talking woman emancipation, upliftment, education and blah blah blah, we are still having one of the highest rape cases registered everyday. We still misbehave whenever we get a chance, we still love to pass a comment irrespective of age, location or situation. I mean when all these are going to stop? We talk so big about being cosmopolitan, gen next, youngistan and the result is in Delhi girls are not able to go outside after 7 in the evening alone!!! Is this our meaning of a metropolitan city! We are inhumanly hitting girls in the pub, we are molesting them in the New Year eve in front of 5-star hotels and we stalk whenever we find them alone. I know all men are not doing this, but still there is big section and we are simply keeping a blind eye on this.

I don't have a sister and I am yet to get married. But I have experienced and gone through the feelings of my mother closely. And only staying away from her made me realize her place & importance in my life, my heart. Let’s just put my observations of many mothers I have seen in last 24 years. They remain tensed more than 24 hours a day, and all the time for their children and their husband. Even if the children are married or their spouses are just too busy to even call back to say hello. You know what; they love shopping, they love going out to have dinner, they love travelling just like a teenage girl; but they hardly get to do these things in their life as once they step into another home, they get stuck taking the responsibility for everybody else, they start (sometimes they have to) loving everybody unconditionally, they simply forget the word ‘priority’ as they gift this to people around. I mean how can be someone so selfless!!! It takes a hell lot out of somebody not to think about herself every morning she wakes up from her bed. But these women spend their lifetime without asking themselves "Am I happy". Such an irony.

No. Just don't assume. She is NOT okay. Ask her. What she really wants. She is endowed with nature's creative power. Let us empower her with right to live respectfully & choose independently. As Shobhaa De, in one of her recent columns, rightly said, for every Hillary/Sonia/Oprah there are millions who live and die in grief & negligence. This grief falls on them like steady rain that never lets the sun shine through those dark clouds. Another dimension of a woman's life is the relationships she nurtures. She plays so many roles as I have written earlier that she needs space to nurture them.

In my experience, the men or women, actually seeks you out if he or she really cares. It is important to let yourself be missed or to miss. Men are nobody to give women opportunity or options. What they can give is respect, freedom and space to help them grow in their best way possible.

Saluting the spirit of womanhood.

Happy Women's Day.