Emancipated Woman

Reading an old open page editorial in The Hindu (which I unfortunately missed at the time of publication) about stay at home moms reminded me of an essay read in my graduation days called the emancipated woman by Ambrose Bierce where he talks about the new age woman and her entry(read conquering) into the male bastioned world. Since my little brain was overcrowded with innumerable memories in little portions stored for family, class work, love, future etc, there was no corner where my old classroom memories were stored, so I rang up my grad friend-cum-best friend who was the class topper and asked her. ‘I’m sorry hon, I don’t remember’, came the message. I didn’t lose hope. I racked my brains for that one word which we used to use quite often after we studied that essay- self deprecating, self- emanating… self emancipation. Bingo! I hit the word- or rather the word hit me and quickly I searched for the essay on the panacean Google.

Ambrose Bierce said that women may have entered the male bastioned world with guts and courage and may be doing things that they do but if they have entered the male world which means the female world is going empty and then, who would enter the female world? Going by some of the reminiscences of my life, I remember that my father couldn’t manage without my mother any time. When I was still very young and my elder sister could manage to master the skills of culinary art and pushed me to master the skills of washing utensils and sweeping floors, it was as if taken for granted that mom would do all the work, and when I say all, I mean all the work- both in- house and out-house like buying veggies for the house, purchasing anything for the house, paying bills and what not. When mom had to go out of station for a while, she used to pass on all the responsibilities to my elder sister which reminded me of a television soap scene where the mother-in-law hands over a bunch of keys to her daughter-in-law. And then when that day of journey arrived, my dad would grumble and send off my mom and come back; the house would become rather empty, and I used to feel some kind of eerie silence and a sort of vacuum made me claustrophobic and I used to run and sit on our terrace steps. My sister would no doubt try her best to do all the house work but still, that vacuum used to engulf me and I used to run away to my cousin’s place to avoid that horrible feeling. And when in the evening (or worse, next morning) mom comes back, she would bring with her that bubbly, good natured feel and I would hug my mom and never leave her that day. Dad would feel relieved and happy when he sees her and start off with his usual ‘did you see my shoes, pen, books, newspaper...’ and mom would be like ‘ can’t you search for it yourself? Don’t you know where your stuffs are kept’ and dad would give a sheepish grin. I could almost see the happiness on my mom’s face when she would get back to her work at home. She never felt like a captured slave made to work but rather felt happy to do everything for her family and she also takes care of her old parents who stay near us. My father knows that he cannot do without her and never felt sorry for it! She had her power in the family and we were under her, protected.

True emancipation does not mean that women should wear jeans and work like a man with a man and show one’s masculinity. To be like a woman, shying away and coy natured maintains the symbiotic relationship between the two genders. To be like a woman, it’s not easy, to think like her, it’s impossible and these men can never achieve it and women like my mother know it and are proud of it!