Good Wives

Chanced upon an article from a 1955-issue of a women’s magazine that is still in circulation. The article was very interesting! It talks about how you can be a good wife (but of course). It provides a great insight into what a wife should have done in those days when a husband came back from work. I will put down a few points so that you know how it goes:

1. Prepare yourself. Take 15 minutes to rest so you will be refreshed by the time he is home. Touch up your make up, put a ribbon in your hair and be fresh looking.

2. Listen to him. You may have important things to tell him but the moment of his arrival is not the time. Let him talk first: remember, his topics of conversation are more important than yours.

3. Don’t complain if he is late for dinner of even if he stays out all night. Count this as minor as to what he might have gone through the entire day.

These are just a few. It would have been a very natural thing for that period, but it sounds so out of place today! I think it would be very interesting to study the change in perception of people by comparing articles on “being a woman” (as it is called now), taking as samples one issue in every 10 years of the same magazine. I’m sure it will be a stark change that we will witness over 50 years. From “A wife always knows her place” to “50 ways to touch your man”, it would be shocking and sensational to say the least!

It is also very interesting to note how even the literature of the past century describes “good girls”. They are always quiet, well mannered, and soft spoken. Unfortunate still, there are countless novels where a “wild” girl becomes a “good girl” by getting tamed under a good parent, suitor or teacher. Take Little Women for example. I absolutely love that book, no doubt. And my favorite character is Joe. She is a far cry from good girls of the day. When things don’t go her way she says “Christopher Columbus!”, and she is very temperamental - losing her cool every now and then. But hey – I am sure most of us would have loved her for her bindaas attitude to life. She is so alive compared to her good sisters.

But well – Louisa may Alcott was not happy about it. In the second part of the book Good Wives, as the name suggests, she tamed Joe. She grew more “mature” and “wise” – which means she became just as boring as others. I was more shocked when I realized that Little Men that I had read long back was actually a third part of this – and the matronly lady in the story was Joe! Aaaaaarrrrrrrrghhhhhhh – where was the feisty, lively girl? Joe had been wiped out to be replaced by a lady – Sigh!

Compare that to today’s protagonist – a good example (though it is not fair to compare) would be Kaavya Vishwanathan’s now-infamous Opal Mehta. Opal Mehta is a “good girl” and well, the whole novel is about how she “got kissed, got wild” and thus “got a life”!

To get back to the article, I must say many of the points are valid today and can be adopted if the wife is at home – like say greeting him with a smile (ribbon in the hair might not be a great idea though!) or not greeting him with complaints at the door – but can you imagine any girl greeting her husband with a smile if he does not come home for the entire night? How many would buy the argument that his conversations are more important than hers? I doubt!

The reactions my friends sent in to the mail were proof enough. It ranged from “They couldn't have been serious!” to “disgusting ...imagine how can anyone write this stuff”. The one I liked best was “You will kill me with the good wife manual. Do me a favor - Make one for the good husband and send it to all hubbies”.

Great idea- so now we are compiling a manual for husbands. You are welcome to contribute. Here’s one for starters:

Please try to understand that cooking is not as easy as criticizing it. Take some time off to try it out and give your wife some rest. If you cannot do that, the next best thing would be to shut up and eat all that she cooks. Complimenting her would help. Remember- she is the boss of the kitchen - she can mix rat poison to your food.

Cheers!
~RE