A TRIBUTE TO THOSE DRIED OUT TEARS

‘people do not live nowadays ;they get 10% out of life’
Isadora.Duncan

It was vacation time again; again it was home for this girl.
It was one of the days when Amma was getting excessively proud of her daughter and decides to take her to her school (where she works) to flaunt the engineering prodigy in her daughter!!!!!!!! She practised for long how she would tell her fellow teachers how hardworking her daughter was, how trivandrum has been so harsh to her and how she has become half her size (mom pls; if I am just half now; ur whole school would run away seeing ma original size….so u cud have avoided that hyperbole!!!!!), how she stands first in her class( phooey!!!!!!!!),how beautiful she was( my foot!!!!!!!) blah blah blah……there is an advantage to this show-off mela. Seeing the pride that amma takes in her, she regains the self-esteem that she lost during her engineering expeditions!!!!
The 4o’clock bell rang when this ritual got over.
We had to start back home.As usual mom decided to take the local passenger train @ 6.30..Till then we did a lil bit of shopping in the “metropolitan malls “of Kasaragod, bought ma favorite Ullithandu;bought Kannimaanga for pickle ;then two saris for 150 (Amma has this passion for low price saris and even more bigger one when her fellow colleagues are buying it.Question of pride ryt??????????).After a tea we came to the station for the long wait for the train.
The same frame of events.The huge population of working woman discussing the usual things ,”which is the best Sambar powder????How good it would be if Indu of Sthri rejoined with Hariettan!!!!,the same old disturbing thoughts of the curry for dinner,the new gossip in office, how rude of the govt not to increase the DA”……
That is when the train rolled into the station,then it was this mad rush towards the train to make your seat in the Ladies coupe secure with towels,plastic covers….all is settled in the Ladies coupe in a split second, women are packed as in a tin of sardines…The train is thinking of rolling out of the station,it shrieked out loud twice…That is when Amma noticed the absence of the big sack of rags ,the huge bunch of recycled plastic bins and last but not least of Chinnamma ,the Tamil lady with the shining nose rings and paan lined lips…..Both of us tried to look around.
The train had started moving outta the station.Suddenly there were these big bags rocketing into the train and Chinnamma climbed into the train simultaneously singing eulogy to the Kadavul who helped her in catching the train….
Chinnamma slouched at the corner seat ,there was no usual happiness in that gawky figure ,sari was clad as untidily as possible, there was this sudden prominence to those wrinkles where tears had earlier meandered and lately dried out.There was this dark curtain of gloom and anxiety on Chinnamma’s ever cheerful face.
Neither me nor amma could figure out what was wrong.We thought silence was a better ornament than human concern @ such hours….after all of wut use can a Tamilian woman selling recycled plastic be to us?????????
Suddenly there was this sudden breakdown from her,the sudden outburst of all the angst she has always covered with her cheeky smile,the heavy deluge of doubts and speculations about Rukku’s and Nalini’s future(her lil daughters)…..then went this sudden raining out of curses to the Kadavul who has given her nothing but suffering from her childhood….The Ladies Coupe stood witness to the hysterical Chinnamma’s venting out…..this is when Girija came with words of consolation and asked her what had happened…
Chinnamma narrated all that had happened…
“that devil ,my husband in God’s name came to take away his share of the daily earning to derive his pleasure from the Liquor den….Rukku is having a chicken pox ,huge rashes have sprouted on her and the girl hasn’t spoken for two days….i had to take ma baby gal to the hospital…for how long can I leave her shivering on the bed with another one of the same age to take care of her????????…..That is when the drunkard devil snatched away ma day’s earnings and ran to the den….i was not givin up….my Rukku should not die when am alive…am not givin up,never ,never ….
There I saw him sitting in front of bottles of arrack,I begged ,perched by his side so that I could save my daughter,….but the devil wont change….he was an animal…
There was no way out…..i trashed down all the bottles,broke all of them .snatched away my money and ran for ma life…the devil sprinted behind me,….Kadavul was merciful at least there ….i could catch the train….else he would have killed me….he would have oozed out the last bit of life out of me ,made ma kids orphans…..he would have killed me…he would have……..” she sobbed.

‘A life on the edge ;a tale of incomplete woman hood ;the same poetry of melancholous existance ;the same rag-tag alliance of simple things that keeps her going; the small savings for the distant marriage of her gals; the dreamless nights ;the anxiety of the scary womanhood going to come to her daughters; the clinging on to the borderline, the rigmaroles of lost passions ;the same miasma of corrupt eyes giving her the sly look all the time…’
The courage to still hold on to the slippery perch provided to her…. the silent hope that someday things would work out her way…. the bravado to never be cowed down by all the bad happenings…the strength to egg on…
There has been times in ma life when I have decided to give up cos of just one lab where I din get an output, I hav seen frens attaching the “lost and lonely “tag to them and resorting to smoking cos of some tough exams or cos of some gal who ditched him….well with a deep breath….i wanna ask…..was it worth all the fuss??????? Is this game that frivolous????
Well I dunno….these silent struggles not asking for any praise ,the profitless entrepreneurship just to survive , the long prayers to just exist…….these makes it the most profound frame of life…….


Thus ye live on high,and then on the earth;
Thus ye live on a high ,and then on earth ye live again;
And the souls ye left behind you;
Teach us ,here, the way to find you;
Where your other souls are joying;
Never slumber’d;never cloying;
Here your earth born souls still speak;
To mortals ;of their little week;
Of their sorrows and delights;
Of their passions and their spites;
Of their glory and their shame;
What doth strengthen and what maim;
Thus ye teach us,every day
Wisdom though fled far away

(BARDS OF PASSION AND MIRTH, John Keats)