What Lakshmi thinks about International Women’s Day

It was 8^th March yesterday.  I spent the whole day taking calls and replying to messages.  I could not put my phone down for a few seconds without it buzzing or ringing again. 

“So many calls today didi (sister),” said my maid, Lakshmi, after about ten minutes of watching the goings on.   “Is it your birthday?”                                                                                                                                 

“No, Lakshmi…its Women’s Day”.  “Happy Women’s Day!” I smiled at her.   

                 

She looked at me doubtfully.  “Like how there is a special Teacher’s Day for teachers and Children’s Day for children in school?” “Yes, Lakshmi,” I said busy typing a reply to a friend on Whatsapp.                                                                                                                      

“Who makes it special for women, didi?” she asked, stirring the dal.                                             

“All those around the women, their children, their husbands, family members, all those who work with them in their workplace…….”                                                                                     

“Oh that way…….but that is almost every day didi, why a particular day?” 

                                         

“Your family makes it special for you every day?  Lucky you, Lakshmi!” I laughed.      

                  

“They don’t wish me didi, but they praise something I have done for them, and that makes me happy beyond words.”  Her face lighted up.     

                                                             

Such as?  “The children’s teacher praised the white covers I put on their exercise books using last year’s calendars… I used the transparent plastic bags you gave me last month to put over the white sheets,” she grinned.   “The children were over the moon and came home and told me.  It made me feel like Women’s Day.”   

                                             

“That’s Mother’s Day,” I corrected her.  “But I am both didi…….woman and mother?  If I feel happy as a mother, the woman in me does not feel overjoyed?”    

                                                      

Yes, I thought ….. we are inseparable.  It’s difficult to make out where the woman ends and where the mother begins.    

                                                                                                          

“When my husband asks for a second helping of the chutney that I woke up at four o’clock to make….. that makes it Women’s Day for me too.”        

                                                                

“That should be Wife’s Day, third Sunday in September…… or Housewives Day, November 3,” I said, consulting Google quickly.  I was beginning to enjoy this.     

             

“There are all these days?  No one told me,” she said.        

                                                        

“It’s news to me too……..I didn’t know either,” I told her.     

                                                          

“But no matter didi, all days are ours,” she replied, in a very self-satisfied tone.  “Last week, my brother came and told me how Iife-saving the money had been that I lent him out of my savings……..he was able to pay my nephew’s fees.  He wished God would give a sister like me to every brother…….There were tears of happiness in my eyes.  It felt like Women’s Day didi,” the tears beginning to well up again in her eyes at the memory.  “I praised him too, he is such a good brother, for saying that to me.  Whose brother will come to their house to say “Tu sachmuch Lakshmi hai re!” (You really are Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth)                                                                                                                         

Happy Sister’s Day, Lakshmi, I thought (First Sunday in August).  

                                          

“Didi, do you have a brother?  Yes, you do.  I remember seeing him at Rakshabandhan last year… you told me to make puranpoli, because it’s his favourite” she reminisced.  He loved it and you praised me….you even shared the money he gave you as a gift….Women’s Day didi?”                                                                                                                

“No Lakshmi, Rakshabandhan.”       

                                                                                                     

“No, Women’s Day didi…sisters are not women?  You are not like a sister to me?” She was getting a bit mixed up and so was I.  But no arguing about that definitely, sisters are women too.  

  

She got ready to leave, her work done.  But quite obviously, this Women’s Day business had set the ball rolling.  Adjusting her sari and checking her bindi in the mirror, she continued, “My neighbour Gowri, you know the one whose husband works in the hospital, she wants to marry off her daughter as soon as that girl passes school.  I am convincing her to let her finish college………I have promised to help find an educated groom for her, who will appreciate the girl, not her dowry.  You know what?  Her daughter is so grateful, she told me “Even my real aunt would not have done as much………you are more than an aunt to me!  If only my female relatives could say things like this to my mother like you did, mausi (aunt)…….  See, you are calling me mausi, I told her.  Her name is also Lakshmi, by the way.”     

                                                                           

“You did your duty as a woman towards her, Lakshmi,” I said, my heart welling up with pride.                                                                                                                                                          

“But check your phone, didi (Google, she meant).  I am sure it will call it Aunt’s Day didi, not Women’s Day!” she beamed.  She knew she had me there.

Women’s Day, anyone?   For that matter, why leave International Men’s Day, Father’s Day, Husband’s Day, Brother’s Day and Uncle’s Day aside? As Lakshmi would say, “Men are not fathers, husbands, brothers and/or uncles didi?  Not all, but some of them at least are all or some (of the above).”  So where does a father end and a husband begin?  

It’s time to take a leaf out of Lakshmi’s book, I think.  Question ourselves. Separate the hype from the reality, the empty show from true appreciation...and above all, respect.  All days of the year.  Any takers?                

Image credits: usnoeticgroup.com