the kitty brigade

THE KITTY BRIGADE.
She wondered why all the weight went straight to her boobs and the butt. Agreed it made her more voluptuous and sexy but have men ever realized that the strap really cuts in or the butt looks big and huge in a pair of jeans. Oh! The follies of nibbling on those party snacks, and just the tiny bit of cake; just sampling it over the winter wedding scene had made her gain these pounds. The summer was here before one knew it, and she had her coffee kitty tomorrow. It seemed time just flew in her life. She didn’t know why people kept on moaning that they were bored or life was so slow, they were in a rut. She, Mrs Dhillon couldn’t hold on to time. It just slipped out of her hands like sand. Peering in to the mirror she wondered if she needed to get one of those miraculous face-lifts/peels which Dr. chamkiwala advocated in Delhi. This Parsi doctor who had just returned from gay Paree last year was in a greater demand than the maid agency guy on whom life revolved in Chandigarh. Hmm, that was another thing on her –to –do list. Her own dear maid was leaving right after Holi and she wondered in her heart and her mind whether she could function without her…
Anjali her maid could do everything, she was the one who knew all about her nuances, the right way she wanted her coffee, tea her toast ( secret indulgence with butter) the way she was fanatical about her whites, her shoes which had to be dusted , cleaned and kept in a row or her sweaters which had to be color-coded. She could do without her husband (he was anyway so busy in his political career) but without her she knew life would lose its order. Well, money always bought everything, she thought smugly.
Right now the pressing thing was the weight which was giving her a more fulsome appearance and finally the cleavage which she had always wanted! Should she, shouldn’t she? Simrat, wondered whether she could get away with wearing the new strappy blouse and cause a sensation, and heads to turn. It would be fun to break away from the mold of those crisp Fab India kurtas and voluminous dupattas which were her trademark every summer. Hmm, dialing quickly to her comrade –in arms she told her about her newest quagmire and in the same breath asked her to book the beautician who would wax-shax her and do her hair for tomorrow.
With a pen in her mouth, music blaring in the background, the soft strains of Atif Aslam, she said, ‘anjali hurry up!”
Anjali, kept on ironing, she was lost in her thoughts. She was thinking about Nandu, the new help. Oh! How handsome he was, just like Akshay Kumar. She planned to sneak out at night when and Bhaji and bibiji came back from one of the dinners they routinely attended. It all seemed like a dream when she had first come to Punjab from the sleepy hamlet of uria situated far way in Jharkand. Three years ago when she had had been sent to Punjab, it all seemed so alien, frightening; to hear a foreign language, their boisterous voices and imagine no rice! And they wore clothes so differently, no saree a three-piece contraption with a chunni which was a death-trap forever getting caught in places unimaginable. But, now she wouldn’t trade Punjab for any place, she loved the family like her own, had grown to love the food, a mixture of roti daal ,more daal and the vegetablesand the omnipresent lassi. Agreed, she missed the spices, the watery fish curry but she was living a dream compared to her brethren. Daarji in his soft tones, who forever slipped fruit, mithai to every worker, in his cool white kurta-pajymas, he radiated serenity just like her gods. Vade bibji the fist which ruled the household was full of love, short in temper but magnanimous in her approach to all. Thank god, summer was here, the first winter she recalled froze her to death. Nothing had prepared her for the frigid air which pierces one to the core or the cold which just seeps into one’s bones and no amount of tea would warm one. Summer made life so much better, the air just buzzed with activity, the flowers flowing out of their pots, bees and birds adding to the general madness. Even her skin had lightened, she thought now she was gori due to an unending supply of betnovate cream (bibiji) and all the used creams shampoos she gave her. It was good she changed brands faster than one could blink.
Haanji, aayi, she said coming out of reverie. One thing was that she could dream anywhere at any time, getting lost in the sands of time. She hurried with the suit and shouted for the anticipated coffee before it being ordered.” Jaldi, jaldi leh ke ayoo.”,she told the cook.
Simrat thought to herself that today she would finish all the pending jobs on the home front before her visit to the salon to pamper herself and also get ready for the first of the summer coffee kitties. 4o’clock heralded the return of Ranbir and his cronies who kept the ‘majma’ going on till late evening. Life had changed so much, since the time he had become a MLA and she feared she had lost her husband to a mistress who was unfaithful, unapologetic in discarding one as quickly as a used napkin- politics. This heady mix of power, ambition was an aphrodisiac unequal to any other addiction. She did not know when he shifted from her urbane, smart modern husband to this hard-core Punjabi who had started wearing the crisp attire of kurta pajyamas ; not that she was a snob. Nobody could carry it off than him with more élan’ and sophistication but the ideology change worried her. Why did politics narrow one’s thought and lead to a change in outlook? The desire to lead Punjab onto greater heights was admirable but the stifling narrow approach to freedom in regards to women was disturbing; he had slowly and slowly started making indirect suggestions to her style of clothes, her appearance and even rebuking her over her politics. Emancipation was fine as long as it was in a speech for the masses and to garner votes. She had to suddenly present herself in the right kind of woman, demure, in the background, and not to have any opinion in the world just be an efficient, effective organizer of all sorts at a multilevel. It seemed like déjà vu for her as her Biji ( paternal grandmom) who was also an MLa’s wife from pre-partition times said that she had to walk behind Sardarji , covered with a dupatta relegated in the Zenana quarters. She, Amar Kaur a daughter of a Captain from the British Army who was one of the educated women of her times from Lahore College of women was asked to stop wearing lipstick and just be responsible for bringing up the kids. It seemed women of every generation be it the 1900’s to the 1960’s to the 21st century faced the same set of problems. The circumstances, settings changed in feudal Punjab but the problems remained the same as Father Time.
Oh! Where had her thoughts taken her? It was the start of summer, the laziness which sets in; she needed coffee, to get her work done and to stop this dreaming. As her mother said, she had a lot of things which she should be thankful for. Not many women in the society had what she had; there was no point in fancifully raking coals. She needed to hurriedly organize the evening tea, order her books her passion, and to delicately quell the romance which brewing between Anjali and Nandu.
All this and the treatment and what the hell! She would wear her clothes, the oomph! Factor would definitely outweigh the extra weight she had put on. Summer anyway, made her diet and she would be off her favorite chocolates ….
The next morning came and Ranbir was checking the papers impatiently for the articles which had him featuring him as the next messiah of the poor.