The guy who is different.

The alarm was blaring at 7 in the morning and a pair of sleepy eyes opened groggily from under the blanket. The kid was still fast asleep. The face was too cute to be woken up right away, so he let him be. He forced his own lazy frame out of the bed, eyes half closed and lumbered straight into the kitchen.

Thirty minutes later, lunch was packed and breakfast prepped up. He was wide awake now and the ticking clock was no less than a ticking time bomb. It was time for the kiddo to wake up. All that monster truck jazz was keeping him up until late night and he made a mental note to come up with another plan to keep him busy while he got the pending office stuff done. After a lot of pestering and coaxing, the little guy was up.

"Vroom Vroom! Blaze is coming to your face now, close your eyes!" "Its just a soap Daddy. Moreover, this one doesn't have any wheels", the kid said as-a-matter-of-factly. "Mmmm..Okay, Wheels on the bus go round and .." He was interrupted. "I am bored of that song Daddy..". Tired of inventing new ways to make the bathing routine interesting, he just gave a smile and proceeded with the scrubbing, answering a hundred questions along the way.

"Can I buy another Daddy in Walmart, Daddy? We can buy everything in this world right?"
"Mummy said No on the phone, Daddy. Do you hear me, she said No. So you are wrong. You cannot change it."
"That's not how you yell, Daddy. You should say  'I am telling on you'. That's what Glory says."

After what seemed like forever, they were ready. Father and son duo grabbed their lunches, wolfed in the cheese sandwiches and set off. One look at the room with the pile of clothes from the washer, and the sink-full of dishes, he wished he could never come back. He looked for an escape, but he knew there was none. Determined, he made a mental checklist - do the dishes, stack those clothes, cook three fresh curries for the rest of the week. Yeah, that should be do-able, he decided half-heartedly.

The new role was proving to be more than he bargained for. The role of a working mother. Each night, he would crash on the bed, exhausted, trying hard to push away the thought that tomorrow is going to be the same. Then he would remind himself why he was doing it in the first place, and he would feel better.

His colleagues asked him why he was becoming so thin.

His friends asked him why he wasn't showing up for volleyball. 'Don't be so lazy!' they smirked.

'If you put Fitbit on his right hand, he would record the most steps. Cleaning toilets and chopping vegetables..his hands would be moving faster than the blades of a fan..Buaahahhaha!', the friends teased him.

'What did you sign up for, man! '. Someone was flabbergasted.

He just smiled and laughed along with them. Humor is the best medicine, they say. It was his strength.

~ ~ ~

When a large section of men around are shying away from household work, feeling insulted at having to share a woman's job or feeling ashamed to admit that they help in the kitchen or clean the bathroom, one man stood out. He supported his wife's decision to move out of the state for work, took up the responsibility of their 4-year-old and sacrificed the very same thing that a woman is always expected to do, his needs and his personal space. He did not succumb to the  'what-others-would-think-of-me-and-my-wife'  disease and is doing what he thinks is necessary for it to work. He stepped up.

I have just one word for you now, Respect.

PS : Coming from a patriarchal country(India), men doing the house-hold chores is a HUGE deal. Men were supposed to be bread-winners and women, homemakers, a long time ago. With changing times, the women are coming out more to become job holders and earners, but she still remained responsible for all the household tasks. Things are definitely changing these days, men of the house are more helping than before, but there is still a long way to go in cultivating the mindset that no work is less and helping the woman is like saying you care.

PPS : Not to disregard a special sect of men, these go all out to help with household chores. They are a totally different set of breed. Glad to have seen such men in my life. They may comprise around 30% of the men population.

 

Written for YeahWrite.