The Spare Gas Tank

Disclaimer alert. A Funny True Story during A Post Natal period. And I loved, love my Mother in Law, who has recently passed on, God bless her beautiful soul.

THE SPARE GAS TANK    

I always thought my husband loved me best until my daughters came along. No, let me rephrase that – until my mother-in-law came to visit.

It had been decided when Anusha was born, that my in-laws would visit us from Sri Lanka and stay with us for 6 months to bond with their granddaughter and re-bond with son and daughter-in-law.

I’d accepted this with mixed feelings – I loved my in-laws, but I valued my freedom and my role as Queen Bee of our spotlessly clean high-end apartment, not to mention our newly-built life together, more.

My mother-in-law buzzed into our lives, penetrating the strongholds I had erected around my couple-dom, my home, household chores and of course, the kitchen over which I reigned supreme. I awoke at 6am daily, to the sound of furniture being moved around and the swish of the reed broom sweeping dust and dirt away in a frenzy, as if they were not to be forgiven for being there in the first place.

Then, Anusha would be taken from me, to be oiled and massaged, her limbs being plied and kneaded, while I stood, useless, at the sidelines.

‘She will be a perfect beautiful dancer’, mil used to say. (Never mind that it is true today).

Anusha would gurgle and coo as mil would bathe her, then dry and warm her over a hot smoky terracotta pot of of camphor, incense  and herbs.

Stricken with jealousy, locked in the bathroom, I would rant and rave over the cordless phone to mum who offered no sympathy. Mum’s placid answer was that I should be ever-so-grateful to my mil. Having sufficiently worked me up to boiling point, she’d add masala by warning me that I too would be a MIL one day with a son. (That thankfully, will not happen – I have 2 daughters, and am well past my child-bearing years).

MIL would cook up a storm in my tiny, before-mil-came-used-to-be-spotlessly-clean-white-and-germ-free kitchen. Literally. My kitchen bore the after-effects of Hurricane MIL – curry splattered on the white tiles around the stove and on my white floor, sri-lankan-cooking-style-coconut strewn over the drainer. She would however attempt to clean it up, but her poor eyesight prevented her from doing a satisfactory job. This is where I would display my good Daughter-in-law tendencies. I would make a hot chai masala, load a Tamizh movie for her and give her Anusha to hold, while I sponged and scrubbed away at the stains with Sprays-and-Wipes. I could never get rid of the pungent odours though, as MIL invariably never switched on the hood fans.

But, having said that, her dishes would be mouth-watering, exotic spice-laden works of art, carefully, lovingly prepared – the garlic and onions rust coloured, cumin and mustard in one dish, fennel in another, the menu always having been obtained the night before from her son who displayed post-marriage- starvation-syndrome tendencies.

In the Pre-MIL days, I would rush home from work, morphing from a high-flying IT consultant into a gourmet chef. The dinner menu would have been planned in between managing projects and offering invaluable advice to clients. My menu would include colour, vitamins and food groups in correct quantities. A typical dinner would comprise basmati rice, steaming, white, fluffy (carbohydrates); soft, golden chappattis (oh alright, not so soft in the early days)(fibre), green spinach saag, (antioxidants, iron), drumstick and potato kuzhambu (brown gravy), red okra hot curry (brain food), yellow mung dhall (protein) and some orange-ish masoor dhal (lentil soup) to wash it down, followed by white thick curd made from low-fat milk. It would take me ages to prepare but that would be the highlight of the day in the early years of marriage, before the girls came along and when I had nothing better to do. It would all be worth it – setting the table for two, lighting incense to set the mood, indulging in delightfully perfumed shower gels and body lotions, the sound of hubby’s key at the door. Those were the good old days, when we had each other to ourselves, selfishly unwilling to share our warm passionate tight-knit existence. Conversation would be peppered with endearments and how much we’d missed each other, our bodies effortlessly and constantly touching throughout the evening, something we took for granted.

But in all this, hubby stood firm on one aspect which irritated the life out of me. I cooked using gas and we only kept one gas tank at a time. Every time it ran out, which it invariably did when running off-schedule, I used to frantically cajole and bribe  the gas-man to deliver a new tank. I wanted a second spare tank in my kitchen but hubby insisted it would take up too much space in our little kitchen. He would then proceed to lecture on ‘Advanced Gas Tank Management’, being a proficient Financial Management professor himself. Fuming with frustration, my evening would be spoilt.

One dreary morning like any other, Mil ran out of gas and stated in no uncertain terms the advantages of having a second gas tank. Husband reciprocated by getting 2 gas tanks – one for current use and one as a spare. Suffice to say, he was delegated to sleeping in the guest room. He could not understand why I wanted him nowhere near me, putting it down to post-natal depression.

When finally I did throw an Emmy-style tantrum in the hope of making him understand, he shook his head in disbelief, ‘the gas tank? You mean you’re upset I got mum a spare gas tank? But i just got you that magenta silk saree and matching ruby set!’

Looking back today, from this weather-beaten threshold of 54 years, I appreciate MIL for what she had been – a loving, hard-working woman, who’d come from sri Lanka at 60 years of age, to selflessly administer to her son’s family’s needs, when instead, she could have been globe-trotting with her husband.

And all said and done, she did get me that spare gas tank!