Thanking a woman, who, thankfully, wouldn’t be reading it

She thinks that I’m a virgin. For sure, she has got a lot of faith and confidence in me. She believes that I’ll remain as one till I get married. That’s what I would call overconfidence. Or rather, an overdose of overconfidence, to believe that I will get married, in the first place.

If I ever get married, and if the then-happily-married-to-me wife somehow didn’t get pregnant in three months, she is going to think that I’m impotent. She’s always too demanding. And in the occurrence of such a going-smooth-as-a-river situation where the wife gets pregnant and deliver a human baby, and if, the newborn doesn’t have a pair of big ears, or big eyes, or at least a big nose, she is going to doubt the wife’s fidelity and my virility at the same time. She’s one hard nut to convince.

She thought I would never learn to count to ten. She’s a natural sceptic. She thought I’m never going to clear my nursery exams, leave alone the secondary school! She’s a tad too much of a sceptic.

She wanted me to become a bank clerk, or a schoolteacher. She’s one with high expectations. She dreamt that I could even become a bank manager or a college lecturer, and reach home before six in the evening; but she knew that’s just a dream. She’s a practical dreamer. She thought high of these professions only because of the convenient working hours. She’s, literally, a practical one. She knows those fixed working hours are convenient to look after a patch of land and a few cows, and a few goats, and a few pigs, and some poultry. She’s practical minded to the minute detail, even to the extent of being calculative.

When she cooks anything that has no fish or meat in it, it tastes nothing but fresh turmeric, and she blames it on her husband, who won’t eat anything that looks any shade of white. She’s the spice of her home, the only woman among four savage men!

She hates FTV, because they don’t show anything she can wear; and she loves newsreaders, because they change sarees everyday. She knows her taste. And every day she wonders why don’t Tamil and Hindi actors get chronic back pains! She sure can see through the glitz and glamour. She hates serials and complaints that her husband doesn’t allow her to watch the comedy shows. She got a weird sense of humour. She likes Deepika more than Manorama, because Manorama publishes more non-catholic obituaries. And she will feel disappointed on a day, if at least five people she knows didn’t die. She can’t live without being empathetic.

She got married to the first one who agreed, and the first one her father approved, which could possibly happened in the reverse order. She’s a god fearing, convent-educated girl. She believes her great ancestor had got baptised by none other than St. Thomas in AD. 52! She got good faith. Her husband thinks it must be in AD 53 or 54, because her family just can’t be older, and thus better, than his. He doesn’t know that her faith is unshakable. He thinks she's impossible, and for once, I agree with him.

In July that year, just a couple of months after her marriage, along with the generous south-west monsoon that came with droplets as big as coffee beans to play drum rolls on the tiled roof of her room, came an embryo; and that parasite made a good home in her womb. She’s a good host. No neighbour came to retell her Luke 1:42, and she knew the sucker she’s got is a little devil. She’s good with omens. Albeit, she was pretty happy for her growing waistline, because that let her to leave her husband for six months and be back in her father’s home. She’s one good daughter. Her husband too was happy, because his idea of a perfect job is something that is done with the minimum possible time. And the little sucker was too happy, because he was a sucker, and knew he will remain as one for many years to come. That’s how a happy family was born. She’s a good homemaker.

And the time had come to pass, and the little devil was out to learn new vices. Giving her the pain of her life. It was about this hour and exactly thirty years back that the most horrible hours came to pass her. That little devil remembers her with gratitude, about the pain she endured for him, on this very day in 1977, and every day after that.

23^rd of April is also:

St. George’s feast. The saint who protected a country for a sexy chick, and who protects the land and livestock of Syrian Catholics in Kerala for a good chicken… err… rooster. The legend is that he was the Knight of Cappadocia, in modern day Turkey, and killed a dragon, which was troubling the people of Silene, thought to be in today’s Libya. He later was executed by the Roman Emperor Diocletion on this day in A.D. 303. He’s the most venerated saint in Oriental Orthodox Churches, and is the patron saint of Canada, Catalonia, England, Ethiopia, Georgia, Greece, Montenegro, Portugal, Serbia, and the cities of Istanbul, Ljubljana and Moscow. The Roman Catholic Church has reduced his to an optional memorial in 1969, since there are no available historical evidences for his legend. In Kerala, his feast is also known as Kozhipperunnal (feast of the chickens), for the tradition of giving the best rooster among the poultry to the church on this day. He’s believed to protect the livestock from ailments, and the land from natural calamities, and the people from snakes and wild animals. If he’s pleased with the chick, that is.

The birthday of William Shakespeare. There are no records for this either, but according to the baptism records he was baptised on 26^th of April 1564, and is assumed that this is done three days after this birth according to the tradition in those times. But somehow he managed to die on the same day in 1616.

Death anniversary of Miguel de Cervantes. Though by records, the famous Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright died on 23^rd of April, 1616, it was not the same day Shakespeare died. Because, Spain was following the Gregorian calendar, and England the Julian one. Though they both had died on the same day of the same year, Shakespeare had actually died after ten more sunsets. Anyways, 23^rd April it is.

The birthday of Vladimir Nabokov. The Russian-American author of the highly overrated work Lolita, which has only two qualities – the shock value in the 50s, and his natural mastery over wordplay. He was also a lepidopterist (one who chases butterflies), and never had learnt to drive a car.

The birthday of Maurice Druon, Manuel Mejia Vallejo, and Halldor Laxness. People I have never heard about before. Maurice Druon is a French novelist, and was a Minister of Culture for a couple of years in the 70s. Vallejo is a Columbian writer and journalist, and was in exile for 7 years after the publication of his first novel. Halldór Laxness is an Icelandic novelist and the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1955. I would like to read to some of his books. Got the hint?

The World Book and Copyright Day. Observed by UNESCO to promote reading, publishing, and protection of intellectual property rights through copyrights from 1995. The tradition actually started by the booksellers in Catalonia in 1923 as a way to honour Cervantes who died on that day – the feast of their patron saint, St. George.

The birthday of four other people I personally know. And I’ll tell you, all these four people have as different characters as chime, chalk, cheese, and charcoal. And I have my invincible army against the myths of Zodiac in them.