The Blue Thing, called THE..

Every second was difficult. He and I, waited impatiently, for our sister to arrive. Every other minute, we rushed to our mother to ask the same question one more time, “When will didi arrive?”

Cut us some slack! He was 8, I was 10, and didi 5 years elder to me. She had gone on a school trip to Kasauli, and we were desperately waiting her arrival. Or, rather, waiting for the presents that she ‘might’ get us.

And finally, the moment came. We heard the door bell ring, rushed to greet her, and while she spoke to mom in hushed voice, we gaped at her bag in her hand. She excused herself to use the washroom, and we jumped up in excitement to look into her bag to find out our expected presents.

Chips, nah! Chocolate, nah! Half-eaten sandwich, eh!, Water bottle, urgh!, and yes, then, there it was, a thin square shaped hand-size blue-color thing! My brother and I looked at each other, out of a confused excitement, and ran to the washroom. Standing outside, restlessly waiting for her, we pushed the thing inside from that small space in the door for ventilation to ask her what is was that she had gotten for us. That was the end of excitement for us and for that evening.

She yelled at us from inside, asked mom to ‘take care’ of us, at which mom snatched that thing from my hand, and gave us ‘end of discussion’ look.

Later that night, my sister told me that the blue thing was a sanitary napkin, and in simplest terms she explained to me what it was for. Not a very inquisitive child, I did not ask many questions and slept.

That was my first interaction with periods, which only became clearer one year later, when without panicking at a relative’s place, I came out of washroom, and told my mom, “Mom, I peed blood.”, and to her now tensed face, I continued, “It is that period thing. I know what it is. Didi once told me. But, what do I do now?”

What I did not, and have still not, achieved clarity about is the practicing and promotion of 'hushed voices', 'end of discussion looks', 'taking care with silence', around periods. For heaven's sake, it is plain simple biology.