Kuch to log kahenge, logon ka kaam hai kehna

Chhodon bekaar ki baaton mein kahin beet na jaaye raina

…goes the famous Kishore Kumar song. In this one line it beautifully summarises the fact that we ought to blatantly ignore peoples’ incorrigibly wagging tongues, gleefully if I may add.

While everyone everywhere is subject to being judged or compared, this kind of nosy behaviour is quite commonly and unabashedly meted out to couples. How often have we heard, “They make an odd pair”, “He’s too good for her” or “She looks so much better than him”? Even celebrities aren’t spared from this!

I, for one, have been generously endowed with such ludicrous assaults on my self-esteem. Being married to a handsome, 6 ft tall well-mannered guy isn’t easy, so I gradually found out. While I let it affect me a bit in the beginning, soon I saw the humour in it and learned to turn it around.

It isn’t rocket science to understand that even the best-looking couples have to deal with issues like incompatibility, stress, parenting and division of work. As long as everything else works well, physical appearance can take a back-seat, right? Doesn’t it give you the opportunity to carelessly laugh at such jabs?

A hasn’t grown up being leg-pulled or being undermined for his looks. Just this fact is enough to make me take pot-shots at him that give us innumerable hilarious moments to enjoy and remember. My favourite ones are his receding hairline, greying hair, his achingly stiff body (he can’t even touch his own toes!) and his Piku wala Amitabh Bacchan type motion problems! 😛

Some months ago we were coming back from A’s native, by train. A Jr has learned to handle himself well while travelling now, but I was worried about Angel. She was just about a year old. We couldn’t be careful enough about the cold and the potential infection. I was glad though that we had one super cute boy, about 3 yrs old in our compartment.

As soon as we entered, he looked at Angel and started ‘chota babu, chota babu’. Angel liked him instantly. While A arranged and secured the luggage I seated us down, with the boy asking me questions like, ‘chota babu kitta bada hai’ ‘chota babu girl hai ya boy hai’ ‘chota babu ka naam kya hai’ etc. the whole time. Once he was done with Angel, came our turn, and here the fun started. 🙂

His mother pointed out at each one of us and asked him who we were. A Jr became Bhaiya and I became Aunty. When she pointed out at A, he looked at him for a moment and said Dadaji! There was an awkward silence. His mom looked at me; I looked at A and simply burst out laughing! I said out loud, ‘See, I’m Aunty but you’ve grown a whole generation!’ 🙂 🙂

Slowly, others followed. A took it in his stride and joined us too. 😀

It was all fun then, but has now led me to oil and colour his hair even more regularly than before. He loves getting pampered and looked after. Sometimes I oblige, sometimes I don’t. As far as the pokes are concerned, I make sure he still gets enough of them.

This post is a part of #LoveAndLaughter activity at BlogAdda in association with Caratlane