The stark fact stared back into my face from the liquid contents of the cups that I laid before me today morning. Shash was away from me for almost twenty-four hours now and I began believing that I got used to her absence by this time! Also, looking back, I didn't make any mistake while measuring the rice for my lonely dinner last night -- measured just enough for one person. But today morning, still feeling sleepy, I prepared the usual two cups of tea, and only when I was finished pouring that I noticed I have poured an extra cup!
Shash, my wife of eleven years -- I noted with a chuckle when I returned to an empty home last evening -- was all over the place. Her office sent her to Punjab for a couple of days under the shortest possible notice. She had to hurry back to home from office and just had half an hour in all to herself to pack and change dresses. Her train was to leave at 2:40 PM. The resulting mess was all over there . . . the shirt she changed lied on the bed, one of her purple socks on the floor, her trousers casually thrown atop a bag nearby, some tissue papers and one of her business cards strewn on the floor. Apparently she changed her handbag; I picked the one which she left behind from the floor and carefully put it inside the cupboard. I clutched her shirt and smelled it, as I always do when she is not with me for days. This smelling business is something I picked up form her only – it was what she told that she did when I was away to office and she was alone at home … that was long back, we were just-married and she was not on a job then.
Funny how husbands go all ashtray when their wives are not home for days. On other days we reach home almost at the same hour and after that it is quite a disciplined life till we hit the bed. But last evening I again indulged in cigarettes – bought not one but two – after an abstinence of almost a complete month! Lighted one of them and then talked to Shash on the mobile (she was still on that train). Then a feeling of emptiness gripped me. Totally forgot that I had planned earlier in the day to make good use of my lone hours in the evening by finishing the task of washing all dirty bed sheets piled up in the clothes bin for quite some time. Instead I jumped into the bed with the Dog Stories of James Herriot and it was not before 8.00 that I stirred again! Husbands like me do badly need a wife by their side always to keep them on track, it seems!
In the meantime, Shash has reached her destination and made herself comfortable in a nice hotel -- she told me over phone. It was raining there while we had an overcast sky but with no rains. We talked again before going to bed and wished good night to each other.
What I forgot to mention was that I also once made faces at her last night, in absentia, and I wondered, on the side of certainty, if she also did the same at me there! Chuckle, chuckle!! Since our marriage we have been at it, and now it is quite a developed art between us! We have devised various shapes of grimaces over the years, and also have spiced them up with matching sounds!
Good heavens Shash will be back by tomorrow noon. We will be hugging and cuddling, and above all, making faces at each other soon again!
Shash, my wife of eleven years -- I noted with a chuckle when I returned to an empty home last evening -- was all over the place. Her office sent her to Punjab for a couple of days under the shortest possible notice. She had to hurry back to home from office and just had half an hour in all to herself to pack and change dresses. Her train was to leave at 2:40 PM. The resulting mess was all over there . . . the shirt she changed lied on the bed, one of her purple socks on the floor, her trousers casually thrown atop a bag nearby, some tissue papers and one of her business cards strewn on the floor. Apparently she changed her handbag; I picked the one which she left behind from the floor and carefully put it inside the cupboard. I clutched her shirt and smelled it, as I always do when she is not with me for days. This smelling business is something I picked up form her only – it was what she told that she did when I was away to office and she was alone at home … that was long back, we were just-married and she was not on a job then.
Funny how husbands go all ashtray when their wives are not home for days. On other days we reach home almost at the same hour and after that it is quite a disciplined life till we hit the bed. But last evening I again indulged in cigarettes – bought not one but two – after an abstinence of almost a complete month! Lighted one of them and then talked to Shash on the mobile (she was still on that train). Then a feeling of emptiness gripped me. Totally forgot that I had planned earlier in the day to make good use of my lone hours in the evening by finishing the task of washing all dirty bed sheets piled up in the clothes bin for quite some time. Instead I jumped into the bed with the Dog Stories of James Herriot and it was not before 8.00 that I stirred again! Husbands like me do badly need a wife by their side always to keep them on track, it seems!
In the meantime, Shash has reached her destination and made herself comfortable in a nice hotel -- she told me over phone. It was raining there while we had an overcast sky but with no rains. We talked again before going to bed and wished good night to each other.
What I forgot to mention was that I also once made faces at her last night, in absentia, and I wondered, on the side of certainty, if she also did the same at me there! Chuckle, chuckle!! Since our marriage we have been at it, and now it is quite a developed art between us! We have devised various shapes of grimaces over the years, and also have spiced them up with matching sounds!
Good heavens Shash will be back by tomorrow noon. We will be hugging and cuddling, and above all, making faces at each other soon again!
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