The All-Seeing co-resident-A short story
It was all about sunshine and the lovely aroma of filter coffee once we shifted to Chennai. The auto-rickshaw dropped me in front of my apartment; I was aware that it was not going to be easy for me, merely because of the fact that I am a north Indian.
Before I could say, Jack Robinson, my next-door neighbour Amma Lakshmi materialised faster than a fly on a sweet shop window. Her smile was as big as a banana leaf unaware of all her other reactions, and there was something in her that made me shiver: curiosity, and she was ALWAYS watching me, my serenity was destroyed by her.
“Welcome dear! New arrival in our little paradise!” she greeted me before I could even say a word to her. She was inside my apartment watching the contents of still-closed boxes with the intensity of a temple priest examining for a sacrifice.
From the first day I came home unpacked, Amma Lakshmi became a fixture. Surprised, unannounced visits were her speciality on arrival of friends, relatives or colleagues. She'd comment on everything. She would comment on the groceries I bought, the music that I played, the food I ate, to the clothes I wore.
There had been regular lectures from Amma Lakshmi on how to wear clothes, I wore a casual kurta in the evening, and it was her main task every day to instruct me ‘A married woman shouldn’t look so shabby!’
She had been instructing me to wear a saree and kum -kum on my forehead, to wear bangles, and to put a rangoli in front of my house, this would be good for a happily married life, as if she was my, mother-in-law.
Even worse were her relatives. As if receiving mangoes falling from a tree, they’d visit Amma Lakshmi's house. Her relatives were appendages of herself. And so, any relative – a cousin, a niece, a distant aunt – who came to visit Amma had to pass by my home. ‘This is the new tenant, Meenakshi,’ she would proclaim, to an open censuring turned necks of curious stares and judgemental whispers.
The real creepiness? Amma Lakshmi noticed everything.
Leaving for the market?
walking outside?
Every day, she'd be making rangoli in front of her apartment's main door while putting rangoli her constant focus was on my main door and my activities. For example
“Going shopping again, are we?''
coming home late from a movie,?”
Her lamp would be turned on as I tried to open the door with my key. . .
At what time does my husband come to have lunch, why are you eating so late, if I ate lunch late then I would have an issue with acidity was her daily concern.
Worse of all was the fact that she had sharper eyes than a hawk. . . If any person visited our house whether he or she is related to us or not, then how did you guys turn into friends. It was more or less like being on guard all the time.
Her behaviour was increasingly irritating me and, I felt as if she was getting on my nerves I decided to talk to her. I said, voice firm, ''I appreciate your. . . concern, but I need some privacy. ''
In this, she found herself incredibly constrained, and for a moment she was surprised. This was triggered by the fact that sometime later she had a wicked grin across her lips. 'You know Meenakshi, privacy is not all that important, we are a family here looking out for each other’.
And that’s when it struck me, she was not suffering from loneliness; she loved power. The pleasure that she got out of this information was immense; it gave her control over my life and other people’s lives.
I became aware, that a direct confrontation would not work. The solution came in the form of boundaries. I stopped her coming to my house politely. It was not all plain sailing, but eventually, The visits lessened. Even now, Amma Lakshmi continues to peek at the neighbouring houses but from a distance.
But now it is of a different scale, it is a more restrained observation.
Amma Lakshmi. Perhaps, and perhaps for the first time in my life, knew what it meant to respect other people’s privacy.
A Few words:
