My Muse

The task I put myself to, was to write about a woman who can inspire me and other women. The names that stood out in memory were of the women who had lived their lives and exemplified me with good ideals and theories. But as much as I had learned from their past, the urge in me was different this time. I wanted to feel like a schoolgirl in 4th standard who grasps for the first time the serious artist within her. She then stares dumbfounded at the blank paper and cautiously approaches it to draw/paint the best art she had ever drawn or painted. And it was not such a difficult task, I realized as I looked at my children.

I love to write about my children, for them, and to them. Both my children inspire me everyday to be a better mother. But my daughter is my muse at times when I either feel inadequate or
confident of my womanhood. Since she was the older of my two children, her role as my muse started when she was just a pea-sized embryo in my uterus. The apprehensions, the ecstasy, and the pregnancy related sickness all reminded me day and night on how to be the best mother as I could be. But when the doctor said, “What do you know! It is a girl!” The meaning of motherhood just transcended to a whole new level. I had thrown my head back to prevent my eyes to spill any tears. Later when I held her in the calmness of the hospital room I had realized that I had not only given birth to a girl but also a mother of tomorrow- somebody who would take the generation one-step ahead to which I would just be an ancestor. And the importance of being a woman just multiplied in my heart and mind.

That night after I nursed her she slept on my breasts. The nurse came in to take her to the nursery but left whispering to me, “It will be a sin to end this lovely scene.” I don’t think I caught a wink of sleep that night- partly, because I was afraid to smother her breathing but also because I enjoyed her pink softness so much. As she lay, in a diaper, snug on my bare breasts I imagined if my mother had held me in the same way after my birth. And my eyes welled up. Things were not much different from what they are now. People preferred a male child to a female one. Not my mother, she was just a child when she had me-17. And I do not have any prove even today that she could have loved a boy more than she loves me. But after four more daughters her inability to give birth to a son was considered the prime fault of her existence. Sometimes among explicit or implicit disapprovals directed towards her I had felt guilty on being born a girl. But later when the full realization about the advantages and the beauty associated with womanhood occurred to me the delight surpassed the guilt very easily. That night as I held my daughter close to my heart I thought of my mother and those thousand other women who that day might have delivered a daughter like me. I thought of those mothers who were not allowed to feel joyous and victorious as I felt. I thought of those daughters whose births were mourned. Then I realized how tightly I had gripped the small infant body of my first born-my daughter. Most of all I felt lucky.

Another day, many months after her birth, another news of female infanticide caught my eye. My face fell from disappointment. As my daughter lay deep in a slumber I wept for all the unborn daughters of the world. That night when I picked her up, still preoccupied from the news she leaned forward to grab my nose. Nudging me out of that pensive state, provoking a smile with her playfulness. As she whimpered to get out my possessive clutch I realized how independent her entity is from me. She could be anything, she was the blank paper that life gifted me with to draw a masterpiece with the best of my ability. I was the one who would teach her the importance of womanhood and how to be self-assured about her femininity. It was only from me her mother and not her father that she could learn that we are different from men, not equal or unequal, and that that was okay. She would also learn from me the art and need to complement a man and not fight the useless gender fight. I had a whole new norm defined for me. Her small existence had a huge impact on my thoughts and theories of life.

Today, at age 2 years 9 months she can articulate full sentences. The other day she had faltered and got her genders mixed up, she had said, “Mommy, I am a good boy.” “Are you a good boy,” I did not want to impose a correction from my side. Her face was animate with a passionate resistance, “No I am a girl. I am a good girl,” she had said stridently. I don’t know whether her fury was directed towards me for noticing the slip-up or was internal on committing one, but it was reassuring. As I picked up the plate from the dinner table I smiled confidently. I am sure and feel more enthused than ever on being a woman and for my vision in which no daughters of today, including my own daughter will mourn a daughter’s birth when they become mothers. In stead will celebrate the success of taking mankind to a step and a generation further.