Life, Lilies and Surf

Chapter 18

"Where shall the traitor rest,

                         He, the deceiver,

Who could win maiden's breast,

                Ruin and leave her ?                 

                                                                                        Scott, Marmion, iii, st II

"Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,

          Men were deceivers ever,

One foot in sea and one on shore,

         To one thing constant never".          

                                                                   Shakespeare, Much Ado about Nothing,  ii,  3

       "But the noblest thing that which perished there

               Was that young faithful heart !

                                                                 Felicia  Hemans,  Casabianca, st 10

                                                           

Life never waits for one to come to terms with reality. Time and tide waits for no man.  Latha was first stunned when she got the lawyer's notice for  Bhaskar asking for separation.  She went on ruminating .  What harm she had done to get this treatment ?  She had earnestly done her duties as a loyal wife and showed love and affection to her husband and also raised a family.  Does he not have any affection towards his child ?  She wondered and felt terribly depressed.  The shock was severe and was  a bolt from the blue.  Bhaskar always claimed that he came from a traditional family with deep roots in conservative values.  How such a person with his background could even think in terms of divorce especially after becoming father of a girl ?  These thought came again and again to her.  She could never believe that these things were happening to her.  Her mother was furious.  Her father was despondent.  After she was back in Madras, her father was with her.  He had become more or less an invalid physically due to kidney trouble.  Mentally he had sunk into depths of depression.  The last shock of divorce demand had made him to withdraw more into his self, resulting in completely aimless existence.  He started eating very little and and having broken sleep for very few hours and was avoiding any talk with anyone.  Only her mother recovered soon from her fury and said to her, "Don't bother, my child.  Let the fellow go with anyone he wants.  If he wants to leave you, good riddance.  You have a great job, beautiful baby and I am here to take care of you and my grand daughter."  These were words of solace and Latha appreciated them.  But she could not but feel that she had been deceived, treated shabbily and let down.  As any wife would feel, she felt that her husband's behaviour, seeded and strengthened by his passages with Geetha was brazen treachery.  It was natural for her to feel so, as no woman would tolerate her husband's interest in another girl.  It is rightly so as this is one of the primary ingredients of married life.  Some men may consider such a behaviour by men as not a serious matter.  But such men would frown even about a kind word by their wives to any man below seventy.  

Latha found that her gloomy thoughts could not be wished away.  But she had to respond to the lawyer's notice forwarding the divorce demand by Bhaskar.  Regretting the life she had to tread, she found no one to seek solace.  Her old friend Krishnan was in Madras and was working in the office where she started her official life.  He had been in touch with her after her re-posting to Madras.  He had now become a middle level officer.  He was married and it was an arranged marriage.  He had a son and a daughter.  He used to meet her some times and talk to her about her well being.  There was no reference to their earlier days in the same office.  He had always told her that she could call him for any help.  Friendly relationship between a married family man and  a married family man is usually well tolerated and appreciated by the families on both sides.  If the spouses know each other, it is much better.  There are no complications in such friendships.  Possibly all parties feel safe and  not threatened in such interactions.