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Wedding
attire, neighbour's wives and non-trophy chicks
 This
is going to sound a little odd but then you probably
know that truth is stranger than fiction. When I was
young, I had sex with a neighbour's wife. She was 30,
I was 15. No, I'm not boasting. It paralysed me for
the next ten years. Didn't get any. Didn't want any.
Almost persuaded myself it was not worth the bother.
But then I got it all behind me and started out into
the world of sheet-surfing. After a year or so, I thought
I'd found someone who might be it- the happily ever
after I was looking for. Got a ring, got a flower, got
down on one knee, got accepted, got invited home to
meet the family. What do I find? Her mom is my Encounter
Number One. So I freak, I cut and run. I head out. I
call it off. I don't explain. How can I explain? I just
say it was all a mistake and I'm sorry. Last year, I
find another keeper and can you imagine? It's her niece.
What is going on here and what am I to do?
First question first. As for what's going on, you're
a creature of aesthetic habit. You like a certain type.
You follow its genetic code back into the same family
each time. Or you were so imprinted by Aunty Number
One that you can't look beyond her type.
But that isn't going to be your problem. Dr Know doesn't
think there is much you are going to be able to do.
Your lady is going to pick up the phone of an evening
and talk to her cousin and mention your name. Her cousin
is going to say you were the shithead who dumped on
her and dumped her. That was your first mistake. You
shouldn't have cut and run in the first place. When
you discovered it was your Encounter Number One, all
you had to do was pretend you had forgotten. It isn't
likely that her mother was going to be telling her,
right? Can you imagine the conversation: "Beti,
this isn't the guy for you because when I did him 15
years ago he was a Johnny come quickly"? She going
to say that? Any Indian woman going to say that? And
you'd have had a hold over your mom-in-law. Sweet, huh?
And you threw it away.
Is
it just me or are there other guys out there who think
that whoever thought up this wedding thing must be a
woman? I mean, look at the crap you get to wear. Either
it's a suit and a tie and you're suffocating to death
or it's something with loads of crapshit embroidery
on it like some out-of-work courtesan and it's closed
at the collar and you're suffocating to death. Everyone's
having a great time, dancing in the baaraat and you
sit on a white horse with pollen getting in your nostrils.
There's smoke in your eyes and cross legs on the floor.
Then they drink the bar dry, and you can't get a sip
because you're being whirled about meeting this aunty
and that uncle. After which they hide your footwear
and you end up with a woman who has cried her eyes red
because of the bidaai songs. Why, Dr Know, why?
When Dr Know finally got around to writing his PhD thesis
in anthropology, he was well aware that wedding as a
ritual was a patriarchal creation in which a man staked
his claim to a woman and a womb. Our fault, geddit?
We wanted the world to know that a woman had been marked
out with 'No Trespass or any other kinds of pass' signs.
That was why it was made into a public event so no one
could claim ignorance if their hoe was found in a field
to which it was not entitled. Now suppose that were
to happen to you. Suppose you were ear-marked and paraded
as property? How would you take revenge? Perhaps you
could think up something better than to make the representative
of the tribe feel particularly silly or may be something
that made you look smarter, but somehow Dr Know doubts
it. That bandgala with the sequins and the dry period
is part of womanhood's grand plan to get their own back
at men.
How
is it that all the guys who write in to you say that
they have a babe who's hot in bed, great sense of humour,
intelligent, savvy, all that kind of thing and then
they find just one fault with her? No, I'm not saying
that they should overlook the fault and thank their
stars. (That's your territory, Doc, and don't think
we haven't sussed you out.) I'm saying: where do they
get all these great chicks? I'm saying: how is it that
when I get a woman who will go down on me, she's the
kind you can't take out in public? Or she wants me to
reciprocate and she smells like seafood, yeah, but like
seafood that's been out in the sun, drying for a while?
Or how is it when I get a smart chick, she's the kind
who thinks once a fortnight is enough for any civilised
couple and we aren't animals, are we? I want one of
those great chicks with just one flaw.
Those guys do too.
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