In Praise of Living Long and Badly: This, Too, Is a Man’s Sad Lot…

I hate raising my voice, and I hate hearing raised voices.

So I always mumble when I talk, and chuckle quietly when I laugh.

They say no one with a loud voice is a bad person. They also say a real man has a loud voice, which leaves a softly spoken man rather out in the cold.

Even if I were caught misbehaving, and a furious woman punched me, kicked me and seized me by the throat, I could bear it in silence, let her do as she pleased, and wait for the storm to pass.

But if she flies into an even greater rage and starts shouting loud enough for the neighbours to hear, then, from some old trauma or other, I go to pieces at once. “It was one hundred per cent my fault. You’re not the least bit to blame. I’ll change anything. If there’s anything wrong with me, tell me, tell me all of it. Only please don’t shout.” Down on my knees, or whatever it takes, I surrender unconditionally.

People say that in the old days men were the strong ones, and now it is women.

But I don’t believe it. Women have been strong since the age of the gods.

Wasn’t it out of fear of that strength that men banded together and marshalled every convenient institution and custom to hold women down? Yet all their efforts were in vain, and the age of shining women is now about to dawn.

And so it should be. As long as nobody shouts.

“I’ll die, I swear I’ll die!” she weeps, and it is the man who goes first.