Ammalu, you were really good looking and that was why I married you”
“You were not at all good looking and still I married you. Now the position is no better’; still I continue to live with you”
———————————–
“Ammalu, everyone in this world is praising me. Aren’t you proud of me ?”
“Im indeed. if they actually do that”
“Then, why are you not praising me?”
“I have to do cooking and house keeping. If you take over my duties for a day, that day, from morning to evening, I will do nothing but praising you”
————————
“It is my earnest suggestion to you Ammalu, as your
earnest well wisher that you should snap your association with my former female colleagues and friends and live ever happily”
“Earnestly, I don’t believe , it will be of any help to you. I have all your past history recoded, as stone inscriptions and there is no space to add an alphabet more”
——————–
“A lion and a mouse can’t live under the same roof. I’m the lion and you are the mouse”
“But, we have been living all these years. Now, what happened suddenly?”
“You are wagging your tails too much”
“Yes, I do. And that is why I’m worried why you want to live separately, when you have lost strength even to wag your tail”
—————–
“Ammalu, your mom tells every one, ‘SP is not a bad guy, but the way he looks, the way he think, the way he talks are all bad’. What does she think of herself?”
“Why don’t you ask that question to her? You spend an hour with her complaining about me, every evening”
“It is true that I meet her in evenings but, I don’t spend the whole hour complaining about you”
“Approximately, how much time ?”
“About half”
“The rest, doing what?”
“Looking at her sari, wondering how much she would have paid for that, looking at her–”
“Please stop. My mother’s assessment about you was absolutely correct. Your looks and thoughts are equally bad”
“OK. But why complain about my talk? Shall I question her?”
“No, I know that your talks too are not good”
“Then why did your mom certify that I’m not a bad guy?’
“As I tell her so”
“Why you say so?”
“as you are my husband. My husband can never be a bad guy”
—————
“Did you ever achieve more than 10 per cent marks in the fifth standard, the highest you studied, when your mom pulled you back from the school, Ammalu?”
“Had I known that she would marry me to a high standard scholar, who would enquire about the percentage of marks, after fifty years of married life, I would have certainly attempted for a better score”
———————–
“Ammalu, would you have been happier, had you married someone else?”
“Can’t say unless I marry and live with him. But I’m certain of one thing. I would not have enjoyed life as much as I do now”
“Because of my virtues, velocity of action and thinking and scholarship?”
“Lack of those”
—————–
“Ammalu, this is between us. Of late, I’m sad to observe a veil of shadow over the smiles of my friends, Ammini, Paru, Parukutty, and almost every one. Worried that nothing is wrong in their family life”
“This is not between us alone. It is between all of us. The skin and muscles lose their flexibility when one ages and there is nothing to worry about it”
—————————-
“I’m writing a four page article for a popular magazine and I want your help. The topic is, ‘What keeps a man and woman together under a same roof? Money, children, social obligation and what else ?’
I want your help on that, ‘what else'”
“Mutual trust, Mutual compassion, Mutual understanding, mutual give and take attitude, mutual open talk- nothing else”
“Nothing else? Foolish woman! Nothing else, not even money, children? Then, why do I need four pages ?”
“You don’t need. You need only one line”
————————————-
Wonder how our relationship lasted so long, defying the Theory of Compatibility, Ammalu.
Sorry, you would have never heard of any theories
or theorems on Physics or Chemistry”
“Physics and Chemistry theories on human compatibility? No, I’m not aware of any.
Have you heard about the Theory of non-compatibility. Our marriage survives only as per that theory”
“What is that?’
“The husband, wife relationship is based only one basic principal – that is, one should be male and the other, female”
————————————————————————————
“When I met you for the first time Ammalu, you were a nail- biting, needle-smiling, nickers-wearing, naughty girl, hiding behind the door. Now, out of fear, I’m hiding behind the door, when you enter the house”
“For the sake of rhyme, you made me a ‘nickers- wearing’ girl. One more rhyming word, one more singing, one more boastful blab,you will see a BadrakAli and not me, before you”
“Too many ‘one mores’. Why can’t I have friendship with one more lady, Ammalu?”
“If you want you have one more woman as your wife, but no friendship business”
“OMG! Two BadrakAlies under one roof!”
Cartoon courtesy: RamKi
