I thunk, thunk and thunk. Pssst… Google doc has underlined my words in red and rightly so. Let me modify that disastrous beginning with a more acceptable one. Here I go:

I thought, thought and thought. Not that it is a new activity for me. Of course some disdainful types think (that word ‘think’ is wasted on the likes of them me-thinks) that homemakers cannot think. I swear I saw it on Facebook! What gave them the idea beats me. If you ask me (and even if you don’t), I will give you the answer: They are talking through the proverbial hat. Just think of it this way. If some homemakers somewhere hadn’t ‘thought’ about working outside the home, and done something about it, would these talkers-through-hats be sitting in an office and grandly denouncing homemakers? Ha, try and get out of that one you talkers-through-hats. But whaddya know, I have infamously digressed, as is my wont.

As I was saying I thought and thought and… okay, by now you have got the drift,  and have arrived at the conclusion that I don’t want to do it. Sigh. I can almost hear the L & M (Lord & Master) guffawing on reading this. He is seeing this new avatar of mine, the Dilly-dallying Wife, for the first time in his life. Normally it is, I want this dress, I will take that shoes, I want to see this movie, I will eat that dish, I want the shelf just there, and so on and so forth. Very definitive answers, if you know what I mean. In short I have always been The Wife Who Knows Her Mind to him.

In the past few days this, our home, has been converted to Wavering City. It is, Okay, I am gonna do it one moment and No I don’t want to, the next. I tell the L & M, with conviction, that I have made up my mind. Tomorrow is the day I am gonna go for it. He nods to say that’s fine. Then I walk upstairs blithely, spend my time doing the odd things I do around the house, which mainly consists of the important job of sitting in front of the laptop and sifting through all the bird-pictures I have taken and showing them off on Facebook. After a while, having given the matter the once over yet again even as pictures were being sifted through, I walk downstairs, and tell him just why I have decided against it.

The fallout is, now he just doubles up with laughter whenever I bring the topic up. So I have stopped using him as my sounding board. Of what use are sounding boards that laugh at you instead of understanding your dilemma?! Hrrmph…

It all started with my hair deciding to do things their own way, taking after me in all probability. If she can’t stick to a routine, does things as she pleases, then why should we, they (probably) exclaimed in unison, at the last convention of theirs on my head, not that they could hold it anywhere else, the convention I mean. A few said, they preferred to stand up at all times and not be so boring as to lay flat on the head. And among them some opted to lean to the left, probably Commies, and a good many others expressed their wish to lean towards the right, definitely the Conservatives. Still more of them thought best not to take sides and sway according to their moods, in the process enjoying the thrilling experience of upsetting the others. The result? I started resembling a golliwog on its worst hair day, on every single day.

I tried frowning at them through the mirror to get them to stop being unruly. They laughed at me and went, nyah-nyah, nyah-nyah. I tried drowning them in oil, water, you name it, tied them up, brushed them hoping to bring them to their knees with the strokes, tried ignoring them hoping they’d fall in line, but nothing worked. They still thumbed their nose at me and swayed in the wind doing the nyah-nyah, nyah-nyah routine.

This rebellion of theirs, after more than fifty years of unquestioned obedience, has unsettled me, especially when people look at me askance and ask what fancy dress event I am dressed up for. Under the circumstances, what was I to do?

I glared at those that had started deserting me, like rats a drowning ship, and through gritted teeth muttered, ‘Good riddance!’  Who wanted them anyway, they who wouldn’t stand by me in testing times? As for the rest of them, I had to do something. I thunk and thunk… I mean, I thought and thought. Brows were knit to perfection to aid thought and finally I hit upon an idea. No I did not need Abhishek Bachchan to give me one. I would wage a chemical war on the unruly rebels, and afterwards iron them into submission. A traitorous bunch, the lot of them, curling on me, just like that, and that when I had treated them well all these years.

I smiled to myself thinking how shocked the Second Born would be when I visit him soon with my beaten-into-submission new hair. Mom? Is that really you?! he would ask. The First Born would have to wait longer. As for the L & M, I warned him not to shut the door in my face when I returned from Hair Wars.

The stage was set. But, that’s when the dillydallying started, strange and new affliction for me. Should I, shouldn’t I? If it was should one moment, it was shouldn’t the other. You see, I am the be-as-you-are type. I’d rather be my good or golliwog old self than anything else. But then I wanted my hair to stay in place like it always used to. It was a  tough decision and I took it with a stiff upper lip. The hairs shall pay for the mutiny.

I sat at my usual place in front of my laptop screen, feeling light at last, and flipped through the recently clicked pictures from our various trips. I paused longer at one. My hair was falling in waves on my to shoulder, all curly. The stiff upper lip wavered a bit, and then a lot more. I gulped. My hair looked good, multi-direction-ed perhaps, but good. It was so me. I realized I loved my curls, frizzy or not. How could I even think of doing all that I was planning to do to them? NooooOOOO! I wailed, never, never, NEVER! I love you all as you are. Love, you see, is forever, crinkles don’t really matter.

This marks the successful completion of NaBloPoMo for November 2013. Yay to me. I did it under all odds, travel, guests, bad health, you name it. And even while you are reading this I am away relaxing in the lap of Nature. Will be back soon to torment you all with more stories. Till then, Ciao.