Acting, a part of life

I knew almost immediately that she didn’t like me. She was polite, but it takes an art she obviously had not acquired to hide the reflection of one’s true feelings from one’s eyes. I read her disappointment as she covertly assessed me, pretending neutrality and striking meaningless conversation in an attempt to shield the horror that flashed initially, involuntarily in her eyes.
“He had another girlfriend whom I knew, you know,” she said with false brightness, all the time averting her eyes from my face where the scars stood out, a testament to the battles I fought and survived just six years earlier.
“We had a great relationship- she and I,” she continued to babble as I nodded politely, chiding myself to look straight at her as she spoke and to smile. “I guess he made his choice now, so we will have to live with it.”
I have been dealing with situations like this for over six years, and I have been schooling myself to ignore them for six years. Yet they hurt like fresh wounds everytime. Like the scars themselves, I think my new sensititivity, my own awareness is something that I have to live with like a hump on my back for the rest of my life.
So I nod, smile politely and continue to look straight at her as she spoke.
That rather awkward moment was my introduction to my mother-in-law.
A couple years have passed and our relationship has not improved.
Truth be told, I can’t blame her for her disappointment. She is a cosmetic person. She loves fancy clothes, jewelry, long flowing hair… and her son is not a bad looking guy. She must have envisioned a “Barbie doll” as her daughter-in-law. Based on his pattern of relationships in the past, she would have taken it for granted that she would have had her wish. Instead, here I am weathered and worn. The chop marks on my face and neck, scars I wear after surviving a vicious attack from a past relationship, mar what little beauty I may have had. I have a missing tooth and thick lips and with my natural nappy hair pulled back from my high forehead, my casual slacks and worn t-shirts, it is apparent to a blind man that cosmetics just aren’t my thing. So to a bystander, it’s kinda funny, in a cruel way, to see us interact. To each of us, our every encounter is like pulling teeth without painkillers. She has to endure looking at me, and I have to endure her looking at me.
That being said, I can blame her as I can blame her son, my husband, for some of the events which unfolded, and which now shape the way we treat with each other.
After our initial meeting, she continued to be polite on the surface with me. Openly she welcomed me into their family when her son and I moved in together, and gave lip-service to the phrases, ‘you are one of us now’ and ‘you should marry’ while in secret she wished that he would return home.
On visits to our home, she would constantly remind him of the things he missed.
“No more of this for you,” she would joke, as she piled a plate full with food for her other son, a rather chubby, hobbit-looking young man, who at 30 was comfortable to keep a room in his parent’s home.
I smile politely and nod.
Before we got married we argued regularly over trivial things, and whenever he called her for advice, she invited him to return home. Yet to my face, she offers counselling and promises to sit and share the word of God.
At first I try desperately for her to understand me. I try to explain some of the situations which may disturb me. I mention the graveyard workers, those women who call him in the wee hours of the morning, just to chat. She listens attentively.
“You must be a wise woman,” she says. “If women call on my husband’s phone, I don’t have a problem. I am not envious. I know a friend of mine who was always nagging her husband, and when he wanted to leave she started to throw herself on the ground and scream… and poor me, I had to intervene.”
I look into her eyes, smile and nod, but I think, “Yet your husband cheats on you. I’ll be wise alright. I’ll have nothing to say to you on that topic in the future.”
So we continue our dance. We greet each other like Judases, with warm embraces, each putting on a show for him- but she is a far better actress than I am.
I am becoming frustrated, so my façade is cracking.
I am six months pregnant. We are expecting a son. We argue. We fight. Our first fight. And like a ruthless cat who catches her prey unawares, she pounces.
She invites him to return home, an invitation which he accepts. His friend comes to collect him, driving as though he is on a highway,though ours is a little street that could barely accommodate two lanes of traffic. He is in such a hurry and in such a temper that without so much as a greeting to me, he pulls into our yard, opens the trunk of his car and begins to pack.
I watch, powerless, as the man I love, the man who is supposed to father my unborn child packs his belongings into the car, cursing me openly as he does it.
They pull out, wheels squealing… I lie on the floor of our living room and I weep.
She never calls. They act as though I don’t exist, as though the baby boy I am carrying is of no importance. My façade crumbles even further.
My mother calls her, one interested parent to another. After all, I am with child.
“Your daughter has to pray,” she tells my mom. “My son has never had an experience like this.”
She promises to speak with her son. She never does.
On our own, he and I mend our relationship and he returns to our home.
She comes in his wake with her plastic smiles and false blandishments. My fingers itch to slap the smile off her face, but I square my shoulders, grit my teeth, look straight into her eyes, smile and nod.
Little incidents inbetween. Little run-ins. By now, he knows exactly how I feel .
We decide to marry.
Her façade cracks.
She is polite, painfully so, but as the walls close in her, the warm smiles are fading.
“You should have come to me first. Instead you sent him to tell me that you are marrying,” she says. “It’s as if you wanted to feel me out, before you came.”
I’m confused. Has custom changed. Is it now that the girl must approach the boy’s parents and ask for his hand in marriage?
I square my shoulders, clench my fists, grit my teeth, look straight into her eyes, smile, and nod.
“We haven’t had time to sit together as a family and discuss this,” she continues. “So we can’t say whether we are okay with it or not. And the time frame is really so very short, we have no money as your wedding date is so close to our daughter’s wedding anniversary.”
“Huh?” I ask myself. “Wedding anniversary? Doesn’t that mean she is already married?”
Aloud I manage, “That’s okay. My friends and family will take care of everything.”
And my friends and family did.
We had a marvellous wedding, which they attended albeit reluctantly, all dressed casually as though for an evening lime.
“Every bread has it’s cheese,” she toasts me.
They leave immediately after the formal function.
One week after our wedding, the hobbit, my brother-in-law, tells my relatives he doesn’t think I am good enough for his brother.
“She is lucky to have him,” he said.
My husband, who is deaf and blind to their every jibe, thinks nothing of this.
“You are making a big deal about nothing,” he said.
After a week, he confronts his brother to please me, then calls me back, bursting with confidence.
“You see?” He says. “I told you it’s no big deal. Your relatives blew this out of proportion. They questioned him and put him in a position where he had no choice.”
The mask slips on for my husband.
I grit my teeth, square my shoulders, and plod on.
My son is coming. The doctor expects him any day.
My father-in-law’s birthday party. I am having pains, but while I am groaning aloud, I do not say to my husband, “Darling I am having pains.” Therefore my husband thinks I am being irresponsible and he leaves me home alone and goes miles away to his dad’s birthday party.
“He’s only 50 years once,” he said.
It’s night. The pains are worse. I am afraid. I want to go to hospital but I want my husband there with me. We always promised that we would be together when I give birth. I call my husband.
Argument.
“Nobody is more important to me than my mother and father!” The words shouted over the phone into my ear, make my head spin. I listen to this as I stand at a taxi stand in the heart of the town, tears flowing down my cheeks.
I still beg.
“But I’m in pain, I think I might give birth, it’s your first son,” I find myself begging. “Doesn’t that matter to you?”
I hear his mother, my mother-in-law of less than three weeks in the background, “Baby come on. Your father wants you. Why do you have to stay on the phone with her? Is she your life?”
I wonder if it is the alcohol, her façade is definitely off.
Doesn’t she care that I am so near to the end, carrying her own grandson? The tears flow faster.
I feel totally helpless and vulnerable.
Driven by fear, anxiety, hurt, pain… a touch of madness even, as I stare into a future I cannot at all envisage, I march to a taxi and demand to be taken to the hospital.
The car pulls away. I am he only passenger.
I can’t control myself. Though the taxidriver sees my pain and gets involved, urging me to focus on myself, I cannot help dialling his numbers over and over again, bearing each insult like a nail pierced through to my heart.
The phone is off. The pain gets worse. The driver turns back to take me to hospital.
I get a voice message.
My mother-in-law.
“…I understand now why your past relationships have not worked for you,” her voice is strong, assertive. “You are very selfish. You are a wicked person. Just imagine you don’t want my son to spend time with his family. I wat you to listen to this because I really mean what I say. I have heard my son say that this is the worst relationship he has ever been in and I believe him. This is like witchcraft. Stop tormenting my child!”
I arrive on the labor ward. My husband arrives under duress sometime later. At first I refuse to see him…
Twelve hours later I give birth to healthy baby boy.
Two days later, she puts back on the mask and calls to apologise.
“I didn’t mean what I said,” she says with a weak laugh. “I think everything happened so quickly, everyone was so hasty. I am sorry. God wants us to forgive each other.”
Smile. Nod. Listen politely…
I am now too tired, too worn to even school myself to complete the charade.
One week later, my husband and I argue over the incident.
“You have never apologized,” I tell him. “I cannot understand why you people would want to treat me like that.”
“My mother has apologized!” He snaps. “You have had enough time to get over what she told you. Hush your (private region used to give birth) now!”
I look at my one week old baby sleeping peacefully, close my eyes for two seconds and then I square my shoulders, grit my teeth, look straight into his eyes, smile politely and nod.

“You are right,” I say. “I have had enough time.”

Women, their own worst enemy

I sit in my tiny cubicle and I type. I sit in dread because I know that at any moment she would appear and would have something nasty to say. I school myself to ignore her, but even as I do it, I know it is an exercise in futility. I would still be affected by whatever she has to say.

My back aches, my tummy hurts. I press my hands against my side praying that the pain I feel would not seep through to affect my unborn child. A stack of work is piled high before me and I struggle to weed my way through, fighting the rising nausea, struggling to swallow the saliva that rapidly fills my mouth, fighting the urge to gag. But this is also an exercise in futility.

I have used stacks of napkins and soaked rags. I now have a bin permanently at my side… and as nausea rises, my knees too weak to move, I reach involuntarily for the bin.

“Oh geed!”

I heard her before I saw her. She walks past my cubicle; face twisted with disgust and exclaims, “She’s nasty!!”

Humiliation makes my face burn. I try to focus on the work before me, but my hands shake, my fingers can’t find the keys. Tears fill my eyes. I won’t let them fall.

It has been like this for weeks. I am three months pregnant and in the throes of morning sickness. I have tried all possible medication for nausea with no change. I had expected the symptoms to abate by the beginning of second semester, but as my tummy rises, the level of my nausea also increases.

A tiny part of me wishes that I weren’t pregnant, just so that I wouldn’t be tormented as I am now and unable to do anything about it, but I banish the though before it gains root. This is a pregnancy my husband and I planned for and as difficult as it may be, no external factor would get in the way.

But I am particularly pained by the woman’s attack. We aren’t friends. We were at one time, but that relationship went south after some frivolous argument. Since then she has gone to great pains to make my job difficult, making catty remarks about my appearance, my relationships and my financial status. I am a temporary worker, she has the security of being permanently employed with several years of service under her belt. She therefore uses my vulnerability as a whip with which to constantly lash out and often makes veiled threats about my future with the organisation.

These I could handle. I did not expect her to be so nasty about my unborn child though. What did he ever do to her. I expected her to be more mature, particularly since she is a mother of three herself.

I feel alone at this moment, for though others notice the way she treats me and though they all agree that her behaviour is unprovoked, no one would stand up to her and tell her that her behaviour is unacceptable.

I resolve to confront her.

Six Months pass.

Confrontation behind us.

I got the opportunity to tell her how I felt. I also gave her the opportunity to address any problems she may have with me, which would cause her to act the way she did. She could only that by succumbing to my nausea I was nasty.

.>sigh< I wish I could have helped her there.

I even made a special visit to my gynaecologist to address it, but he said there was nothing I could do but wait.

Funny, the men I worked with are more understanding.

Anyways... all of that is now behind me.

My beautiful son is here. The spitting is over.

I am now permanently employed as she is and I have heard that her daughter has since been bitten by the pregnancy bug, and feels as I did. Oh Karma... It is only my hope now that this lady would be more mature the next time she addresses a fellow female rather than seek to punish for having a fertile womb.

It is unfortunate when women are victimised in the workplace. It is even more unfortunate when the aggressor is also female. It takes us back to before the 1960s and negates the efforts of our ancestors who fought for the rights of women to establish themselves in the corporate world.
When a woman tries to victimise another woman for the very things that makes her female, what does that say for the many strides we have made addressing reproductive rights, domestic violence, maternity leave, equal pay, sexual harassment, and sexual violence?