She’s not my sister, not my mother; not my girlfriend nor my wife: Should I care ?
I have, over the centuries, been labelled as a pig, a dog, someone who doesn’t respect the other gender etc. I don’t refute any of these allegations. My prime priority in life has always been putting down my female counter-part. Whatever be my relationship with her, I’ve always taken her for granted. Instead of Respecting her, I wasted my energy on hatching plots to demean her. For centuries, I’ve derived a sadistic pleasure by trying to assert my superiority over her. What I failed to realize in the process, was, that I wasn’t great enough to rein her in; she was humble enough to entertain all my whims and fancies. Never did she utter a word of complain , because she knew that I was the fool to try and compare. It’s something like trying to decide which side of the coin is better.
Cometh the hour , cometh the man; slowly and steadily, realization started creeping into me. I understood how narrow-minded I was. I found out what life would be without her. Right from the part where I take my first breath — I need her at every stage of my life. Your Roles keep Changing , but your value doesn’t. I plead guilty to all the atrocities that I’ve dished out to you over the years. I realize today that “Nirbhaya”, “Damini”, “Anjali”, “Ardhangini”, “Durga” — each one of you carries all these in you , and many more.
Today , I can proudly say that yes, I consider you as my equal. But then again , my big ego doesn’t allow me to tell you this. Nor does it allow me to treat you in the manner that I want to. When a girl wearing skimpy clothes passes by me, I ogle. And then I expect my own sister and girlfriend to wear a burqa. I keep saying that she’s my equal, but I ask my wife to be home by 8 PM while I go out and party with my friends till midnight.
I can’t speak for my entire kind, but I take a pledge to change all this today. You are very special to me, and I’ll make every effort I can to show this to you. Never again will I ask you to do something against your choice.
She’s not my sister, not my mother; not my girlfriend nor my wife. Yet, I care.