Becoming a widow saved my mother’s life. She was a strong, educated, classy person whose life started in poverty and hardship. She studied hard to achieve scholarships and degrees. She was an educator and philanthropist, and believed in social activism. She was a loving wife and mother. She supported my father in his academic endeavors, and accompanied him on his career path from a professor of Political science to the Chancellor of a university. At the same time, she started a school with eight students which became a high school with over a thousand students. She raised eight children and was active in her community.
In 1983, my father was diagnosed with cancer, a fibroid brain tumor caused by broken glass from his spectacles which were shattered by a stone thrown in a student protest. My mother was furious at the first doctor who told her to let her husband die after his first stroke, because the end was still going to be soon, the medical care would be expensive and ultimately not curative. She travelled with my father to hospitals in India, New York, Minneapolis and Stanford. She accompanied him for chemo and radiation treatments. She crossed continents to go home to India for respite and return for further treatments. She would not give up hope and was sustained by her faith.
During the last day of his life, my father, who had been semi-conscious and comatose suddenly sat up and spoke clearly, asking my mom to bring refreshments for his uncle who was visiting. She was ecstatic and came running out of his room, telling us (five sibling who had spent days choosing caskets and preparing a memorial service) that if we only had faith, we could share in her joy at his recovery. The nurses surrounded her and calmed her down, telling her that this sudden activity was not a revival or a Lazarus moment, but an indicator that he would die within twelve hours. Which he did peacefully as she read him the Twenty third psalm.
After the funeral in California, she went to New York to my brother. He took her to see a doctor for a checkup before her return to India. The doctor was alarmed at her condition- major blockages in the arteries around her heart. He told her she needed open heart surgery yesterday and he would schedule it in a few days. My mother told him she had been in and out of hospitals for seven years. Right then, she wanted to go home and grieve. No more hospitals. She would be back in a year. He shook his head sadly and wished her well.
Once home, my mother did the Indian Widow Thing. In India, brides wear red, the color of fertility, vibrancy, energy, vitality and life. Widows wear white, as all color is gone from your life when you lose your husband. So a widow wears only white clothes, often her hair is cut short or shaved off. She is divested of her jewelry. In some communities, there is an official glass bangle breaking ceremony. She is not allowed to participate in auspicious events like weddings or christening or festive holidays. Her diet is restricted too. She is given plain vegetarian food, low on spice and salt and sugar and quantity. She is relegated to a muted presence in the home, ‘ghosted” in modern terminology. She is still held in high respect in most homes, but is expected to be a background presence.
There are also households where, due to property concerns, or if the widow is childless, widows are dropped off at temples for care. There are ashrams for widows where they do menial work or beg for a living. Yes, the social activists and social organizations keep trying to help these abandoned ladies, but the widow issue is a sad, politically ignored issue in an old patriarchal society.
My mother, Vanderbilt educated, hobnobbed with Senator Hubert Humphrey and Indira Gandhi, decided to do the Indian Widow Thing. She wore white, she ate simple spice-free, oil-free, sugar-free food. She worked at her school and shed her jewelry. She had difficulty sleeping so she walked on her roof balcony for a few hours every day so she could be tired enough to sleep. She took no medications and prayed a lot. She did yoga.
When my brother went to visit her, he was appalled and told her Dad’s ashes would be spinning if he knew she was doing all this. My brother told her to wear her jewelry, wear colored sarees (she kind of went pastel after all that) and eat proper food. He took her back to New York for a visit and she went to see the same cardiologist who had predicted dire consequences for her health. The doctor ran her tests and then came out to ask her, “What did you do? The blockage is gone from your arteries.” She told him about her widow routine. She lived twenty years after that incident.
The reason the widow thing came to mind was a Times of India report on Facebook about Sindoor Khela. A Hindu wife (not Muslim, not Christian or any other faith) puts a red dot on her forehead to declare that she is blessedly married and not available. Like a wedding ring or a stop sign. She also puts red powder in the part in her hair. The red is actually ferrous oxide powder, called sindoor, and it goes with the red fertility, vitality, vibrancy, energy married theme. In Bengal, there is a custom called Sindoor Khela, where married women dress up, sing songs and play a festive game of rubbing sindoor on each other’s faces and arms, It is dance, music laughter and playfulness-red powder smearing fun.
There is always a but- of jokes, of contradictions, the buts of the world justify, rationalize, demonize, patronize us all. Sindoor Khela is a four hundred year old tradition but it is only for blessedly married women. It excludes those not so blessed: divorcees, widows, transgendered folks and lesbians. In 2018, a movement started to change the old tradition. Women put two dots on the forehead for sisterhood. In Sindoor Khela, they included widows, divorcees, lesbians and transgendered folks, and the events were publicized.
Becoming a widow saved my mother’s life and Sindoor Khela included widows. There are always small moments of triumph to celebrate.
Anita Raturi 