Cleanliness, my foot!

Most bachelors have clean habits. They brush their teeth once a week, take bath on Sundays, and wear washed clothes for parties and what not. But once they marry, cleanliness goes for a toss.

If you are a lady and are reading this, chances are you would not agree. But read on and I am sure you would be convinced. If you are married, I request you to turn a new leaf and stop pestering your husband about his cleanliness.

As I was saying, after marriage Rekha has started finding fault with everything. It starts as early as 3 a.m. I am sleepy and could not careless for cleanliness but she wakes me up and says my saliva is spoiling the pillow cover. She forces me to place a folded towel on the pillow and I get back to sleep. She wakes me up at 6 a.m. – and that`s pretty early for me – and says: “Look, you have spoiled the towel also!”

Bathrooms are a horror. Here are some of the sentences I get to hear…

“Come on…I told you not to take the newspaper inside the bathroom?”
(For the God in me, I can`t understand why she hates me taking the newspaper when I go to the loo. She hates it so much that she does not read the paper. Or is it her excuse?)

“Hey, you left the toilet seat up again!”
(So what, put it down again! Of course, I don`t say it in as many words.)

“The walls are all soap. Can`t you pour some water, or be careful while taking bath?”
(The walls are all soap? Good…we don`t need to buy soap for another two years. And anyways what am I supposed to do? Lie down on the floor and take bath?)

“Did you notice the soap box? It is full of water!”
(Yeah right, I was just trying save water for the rainy day. Or was I trying to make some liquid soap?)

And just when I am done with the ‘bathroom bashing` I am in the dressing room trying on my new CharagDin shirt (I am lying, I buy only cheap ones) when she barges in and says: “Just look at your wardrobe.”

I turn around and look at my wardrobe. I like the tone she uses…as if I were the Maharaja of Patiala and I were caught wearing stupid brands like Allen Solly, Luis Philippe, Color Plus etc.

“Yeah, I saw…what is wrong?” I ask.

“Now, look at mine. Everything is washed, ironed and kept properly,” she says.

“Yeah,” I reluctantly agree. More because, I am late for office and I also need to squeeze in that smoke that she does not know about.

Now we move on to the breakfast table, where I get scolded for being magnanimous enough to drop a cereal for the ants that have formed a cantonment in my house. I also get berated for not keeping my helmet clean, for not washing the dishes I use, for leaving the water bottle un-capped. Anything I do in my house needs to be done in another way – the supposedly cleaner way.

Now, I am all dressed up and ready to leave. I am happy that I can be myself for another 9 hours – that`s the time I spend in my office. When I close the door behind me, I hear her shout: “Look at the mess your shoes have done to the floor?”