Spaces

I’ve just come home from a walk down to Sangeetha Veg Restaurant where I had a South Indian thali for 20Rs. On my way, I decided to stop by the dhobi to get my clothes that were ironed. After a minute’s pause outside his usual haunt, I realized that the tiny, nondescript shop that I pass by unseeing everyday, might be his house as well. Wife folding piles of clothes; son industriously ironing every unwanted crease out of existence. Before giving me my expertly ironed clothes, done for 2 Rs each, the son gave each a departing press under the warmth of the coal-fired iron. My eyes turned from the heavy iron, to the sweeping movements of the arms, to the the muscles of the father-son duo that no benchpress or fancy gym could fashion. I looked around and saw the mountains of crisp, perfectly squared saris, lungis, shirts, pants, bedsheets waiting to be possessed again. As I turned away, a film of wetness inadvertently appearing in my eyes, I asked myself, who would I be, if if I put that much effort -- that much of me -- into all that I do?7 minutes down from my house, lining the road by the smelly canal, is a slum. I passed thatchments reeking with the scent of unwantedness. Deep, dark interiors emanating bodyodorcigaretterice. Entrances so short that even small, hobbled, old women crouch to slip underneath. On my way past the crowded row of back-to-back huts, I saw the women, colorful kodoms at their hips, waiting for a few drops of precious water. An image of their lives in those huts flitted through the screen in my head: married at 16, mothers by 17; alcoholic husbands, motherinlawfatherinlawchildren to tend. Birth and Death. Cooking, cleaning. Waiting.
All in a space the size of my bathroom.