Typical Indian mentality dictates (demonstrated by nosy uncles and aunties loaded with worldly wisdom) how a woman should behave or not. As much as women are plagued by questions like ‘When are you getting married?’ or ‘Don’t you want to settle down?’, single parents, mothers especially, are also hounded by these queries. But the city is changing, and our conversation with single moms, who are fiercely independent and aren’t looking for any man, have revealed some surprising results!
Ruby Ann Masilamani has been raising her two kids —Anushka, 16, and Nathan, 11 ½, on her own for almost 10 years now. The entrepreneur and RJ says that a woman’s ‘single’ status somehow gives people the opportunity to hit on them. “Of course, anyone can ask you out, I just say ‘No, thank you’. A lot of men think they need to fill that space, like a knight in shining armor. But I have worked very hard to get where I am now, and I did that on my own. It’s not something I will give away to someone who I don’t know very well,” she says.
Marcia Genevieve Nicholas agrees with this. Separated from her husband, the 30-year-old singer for Soul Street, a band in Chennai, doesn’t regret her decision to become a single parent. “It’s not good for a child to grow up in a negative environment. And I don’t want my daughter to grow up thinking couples have to stay together for the sake of marriage,” she explains. Now living in Kundrathur, where she and her four-year-old daughter Ocean raise six dogs, she adds, “I am her world now and it’s an amazing feeling. She knows the drill and if I fall sick, Ocean puts me to sleep and even reads to me! You can live without a man in your life. Once you get into a routine, it’s easy and you pace your work accordingly.”
“You have to move on,” explains Jayashree Menon, whose daughters Aishwarya and Nisha are in their 20s. “We are all mature enough to think for ourselves, provided we are independent and educated, both of which is very important,” says the entrepreneur. “Of course, family support does make things easier, but as single moms, we don’t need to take all their suggestions, because there’s no point sometimes. No good vibes come out of it,” she concludes. Well, these ladies have certainly earned our respect as the super-moms of Chennai!
