Men and the art of (not) finding things

Man searching: Photo taken from the internet

Let me start this piece with an optimistic assumption.

Most of you must have read at least one story where Sherlock or Hercule cracked a complex crime by observing tiniest nod of head or a piece of broken match stick, connecting dots and thus zeroing on that crucial missing link. You feel good on behalf of mankind when they solve high octane murders (besides other crooked activities) and what initially looks like an unsolvable crime; they help make the world a little better place to live in, so what if it is all just fiction.

Apart from legendary Holmes and Poirot, there are of course a battalion of famous male detectives - Wallander, Morse, Dalgliesh, Lord Peter Wimsey, Harry Hole, Bosch, Cormoran and closer home in India -  Byomkesh, Prodosh C Mitter aka Feluda, Kiriti Roy, Vimal among others. Having devoured books featuring these men who can find needle in a haystack, I somehow harboured a notion that if nothing else men are good at observing and finding stuff.

Stuff: Defined herein as basic household items like cutlery, socks, eye wear, soup bowls, thermometer, conditioner, paper napkins – you know the stuff you need for bare minimum survival besides oxygen and water?

But alas there is a huge difference between fiction and the truth.

Photo taken from the internet

Being married more than a decade has taught me that finding basic things in the house is like a small adventure in itself. Every time you request (note to readers: not instruct) a straw for the cold coffee or a spoon to scoop ice cream is met with a horrified look. It is as if I have ‘requested’ for the most precious jewel kept in a complicated password protected bank locker that only the Ocean’s series level heist can achieve.

He can never find anything inside the house. Never, ever. And this is not happening in our house as a standalone adventure. I have seen the same scene unfold in most houses. Completely clueless husbands behaving as if they are guests in their own home!

Photo courtesy: Internet

We were invited recently to someone’s house for the first time for lunch. As I went in the kitchen to get myself a glass of water I found the man of the house (a C level exec and quite intelligent) muttering under his breath. On asking what ails him I figured he cannot find forks needed in the lunch table. I had never stepped inside their kitchen prior to this but it took me just 1 minute to find the forks. Nopes, I am not a magician. It was kept where most people keep forks, spoons. But for some strange reason he who lives in that house for nearly 8 years could not find them.

My neighbour cannot locate his car keys (every morning) and throws a fit, my nephew cannot find his own pencil box, my uncle doesn’t know where he keeps his own spectacles, a male friend of mine routinely accuses his wife of misplacing his socks (like why will she do something stupid like this!), a friend couldn’t find his own daughter in a group of kids at a play area, my cousin cannot spot the laundry basket and thinks dropped clothes will land inside the washing machine on their own and my male dog expects me to find his favourite toy which he keeps securely in only two places inside the house!

Photo courtesy : Internet

However point to be noted that my husband NEVER misses spotting his favourite cars even when they are half a km away, he and my other guy friends NEVER miss spotting some really nice looking woman a km away and the same nephew who can’t find his pencil box in his own school bag can spot a tiny piece of his favourite leftover Pizza in an over-crowded fridge where normal eyesight will miss spotting a small sized animal.

Just like most men have selective hearing mode on, their vision and ability to locate stuff is also selectively activated? Or as my husband states that he cannot find anything because apparently I keep moving them from usual places. Which frankly I do not; it is a baseless allegation. I just rearrange things once in a while :) 

Photo courtesy : Internet

Introduction to the holly molly ride:)

These days I am on a pleased-with-myself trip. I finally seem to have a solution. Umm, not exactly a concrete one but what the heck as long as it works for me, I have every right to call it a solution. Well, in a nutshell what I have decided is that instead of spending hours chatting (physical or virtual hardly makes a difference) with my very sensible (V-E-R-Y) girls gang, I will also pen down thoughts and feelings on a very intriguing, mind boggling helluva topic called “Marriage” in a diary format! Twist is it is a diary written like a letter addressed to all the souls who will care to read it – thus ‘blogging’ is the solution that I have been looking forJ

Look writing a diary at my age (when you cross the 30 mark, you feel as if you have earned the right to keep using the phrase “at my age” at every given opportunity) may seem well a lot of things to a lot of people. But I have always appreciated diary writers and I have a sneaking feeling that when I read it years from now - the trivia, trials and tribulations, I will have a hearty laugh over my favourite drink.

Little background:Anne Frank was an inspiration. Like whole lot of school girls I have tried following her footsteps by maintaining a diary, but then when you are 10-11 year old, there is only that much that happens in your life! There is a limit to how many promises you make for doing your homework on time and secretly wish for your friend’s special talent in catching grasshoppers. Being a little imaginative amongst my friends I had even wished for a small scale war or semi apocalypse (well a full fledged version seemed too ghastly) and also a baby brother to be delivered in my doorstep (wrapped in a lovely pink blanket in a wicker basket) but thank God, those were just crazy 11 year old thoughts! Actually, when I suddenly found my long lost diary and actually read that part, I think I was confused whether I wanted a baby brother or a puppy – descriptions for both seems to have merged!

Since I plan to jot down and share my thoughts on the interesting institution (INSTITUTION – just hear the damn sound of it) called ‘marriage’, I may as well start with the very topic itself.

Look, this is not going to be one of those “12 ways to tell whether your husband loves you” or “20 tips on how to make your husband lust for you” types, this is about finding humour in a very serious scenario (come on dude, marriage is serious business!) and discussing marriage and men (my only gay friend is yet to marry so this is mostly about heterosexual experience in marriage/s) in a realistic manner. Realistic translated in simple words mean, this can partially be treated as a forum where one can crib (to one’s heart’s content) about THE husband/ in laws/ men and their irritating habits which you come to know only when you start living with them etc etc. Okay, just so that I not sound like a ‘Mahila Mukti Morch’a type, I plan to include (in bits and pieces) my male friends observations on their respective wives or married women in general.

You see, till about three years back, my sole reaction to ‘marriage jokes’ - the ones your married friends keep smsing and mailing you incessantly was a ‘smirk’. I did not find them that laugh worthy though I was aware that the intention was to crack you up. I believe we need to be honest (at least 80%; I mean after all there is a difference between a diary and a confession box!) so let me be frank; I never really understood the ha-ha quality of the aforementioned jokes, so ‘smirking’ was the best I could do.

But that was then.

So much has changed in these three long (long= zillion) years. Situations have changed, I have changed and of course my sense of humour has evolved. Oh yes, ‘evolved’ sounds so much better than catty! Ahem, I have been married for three years.

These days I wait for those stale (they seem new every time I read them) jokes. They make my day. Nowadays when I read them, I holler, giggle and indulge in full throat-ed gurgling laughter, depending on their fun quotient. Regarding the real funny ones, I even call close buddies (only the married ones) and read them aloud so that one can indulge in collective high pitched laughter.

Man, it is only now that I have joined the bandwagon that I truly appreciate them. They are indeed funny. True slice-of-life stuff.

I marvel at the talented people who sum up this institution with appropriate one liners. Let me share a select few whopper one liners.

‘My wife and I were happy for twenty years. Then we met’. (Hahaha)

‘Marriages are made in heaven. But, then again, so are thunder, lightening, tornadoes  

  and hail’.  (Hahahahaha)

 And of course a killer one – ‘Women marry men hoping they will change. Men marry  

 women hoping they will not’ - Albert Einstein.

 ROFL. His jokes are as good as his inventions. Bless his soul.

You basically get the picture. You need to be married (at least once) to fully decode the above lines and laugh realizing the situation (‘situation’ is way better than ‘mess’, if you know what I mean) you are in. Have you noticed that married people laugh the loudest in a stand up comedy show when ‘marriage related’ sarcastic, merciless jokes are cracked? Its because sitting in the dark while someone else’s leg is being pulled, we -the married ones, empathize with all our heartJ

There are days when I think my husband is cute. No, cutest. And I also think he is funny (in a goofy way) and caring and honest and gosh so much better than so and so. There are days when I sincerely wish that he should go unaided to the terrace and jump from there. On his own. Be a martyr for freaking me out! There are days when I feel at peace being in this marriage and there are also days when I feel I am in a total mess and wonder “will it be better if I walk out’?

Dude, marriage is the scariest roller coaster I have ridden till date. I am yet to visit all the theme parks across the globe, so let me know if there is a scarier ride in one – will keep it in my to-do list before I kick the bucket!  My conclusion is that maze called marriage will either kill us or liberate us – am yet to understand which direction mine is headed.

But then I also look at the brighter side. The learning's stuff. Marriage has truly been an eye opener.

Till I was married, I had no inkling that men have immense capacity to sulk. They can, they do and also succeed in getting their way while at it! I never thought that a guy can find cockroaches eeky enough to pretend (like my husband) that he did not see it crawling in the kitchen sink, lest he is expected to take care of it. I did not realize that ashtrays and toilet pots are same; that both are used to sniff out cigarette butts. Or that towels need to be dried on the bed. Or the fact that asking someone to accompany you to weekly grocery shopping gets similar looks as if you have asked him to join real Mafia (not the stupid FB game silly). Or that ‘watching a cricket match’ and ‘meditating’ are totally similar; not meant to be spoken to or disturbed at all while one is doing either!

I also did not realize that if you have a bad dream or felt scared in one, all you have to do is wake up and roll over and hug the person next to you. There! And go back to sleep knowing you are safe. Or know that someone will make you chicken stew while you are working on an important presentation middle of the night and have no time to even move from the laptop. Well, the soup may be served in a non-soup bowl (my husband has no clue or so he says about placements of things in our house including utensils) but it will be warm and what you needed at that point to keep going! Or that you can call each other by mindless pet names and giggle over it (sharing top secret kind of giggle) or that someone will wait up for you when you come home late from work; even if all the cushions are piled on top of each other rather than where they should be and the house looks like a mini tornado said hello to it sometime back!

But, all said and done, I believe that when we marry we make a choice. A choice, to grow up and be responsible, not just for oneself, but also for one’s spouse. You see, its not just age but even marriage that is contributing to my wisdom these daysJ.

So, mighty reader accompany me while I navigate the twists and turns of the massive marriage maze …am sure its going to be one holy molly fun ride!

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