Swinging from one moment of inexplicable fury to another of unfiltered happiness in the space of a monthly cycle
Nina Simone's voice makes me feel like I am in heat, but of a more mystical kind
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We were at the fag-end of winter, I remember because the homemade Haleem we were gorging on felt soul satisfying in a way that can only be so when you feel ever so slightly chilly. We were a motley bunch of writers, and we'd gone through a range of exhilarating conversations that evening on the terrace of the home of my wonderful gynaecologist, Ruma Satwik, and her husband, Ambarish Satwik, a vascular and endovascular surgeon and author of the short story collection, Perineum: Nether Parts of an Empire.
They'd both been meaning to have me over for dinner, and I, too, had been excited by the prospect of meeting them at leisure. That evening, Ambarish began to hold court. The subject he had brought up was so exquisitely interesting there was silence all around, except for the intermittent sound of our jaws dropping. He spoke about Oeustrus or Estrous, which bore relation to the very feminine hormone, oestrogen. To put it quite simply, oestrus signalled a state of reproductive readiness in mammalian females.
Ambarish pointed out to us that adult human females were the only mammals with permanently enlarged breasts. This fact blew my mind a little bit. But, Ambarish, excellent storyteller that he is, went on to talk about different theories that existed to explain why women were biologically predisposed towards permanent breasts, it having to do with the fact that ovulation is presumably covert, so breasts were perhaps meant to attract the attention of potential male partners, since post-pubescent human females were capable of having sex at any point in their cycle.
Many believe that the concept of oeustrus was lost in human evolution. Intriguingly, the word comes to English via Latin and Greek, referring almost directly to the adjectives 'frenzy' or 'madness'. I read on Wikipedia that Euripides used oeustrus to indicate frenzy and to describe madness, while Homer uses the word to describe panic. Good old (sometimes I think women-hating) Plato speaks of it as an irrational drive. Ambarish brought his story to a climax when he informed us about a study that was done by psychologist Geoffrey Miller and his colleagues in the mid-2000s, and published by the University of New Mexico. He found that dancers made about $70 an hour during their peak period of fertility, versus about $35 while menstruating and $50 in between. The implication is that men subconsciously found women more attractive when they were ovulating.
When I was recounting that evening's proceedings to my bestie, Mona, and her sister, Bhanu, and her best friend, Nusrat, we began to joke about the menstrual cycle which, the way we experienced it, often offered us about three days in a month during which we felt great about ourselves. The rest of the month I, for one, go through a rollercoaster of body-image issues. I'm at my worst in what is called the luteal phase that follows ovulation. Everything is bloated and swelling-prone then, except for my ego, which can be the size of a peanut. This is when men are most scared of me, because I will bite off the head of any man who annoys, irritates or provokes me. And funnily enough, the source of my anger is often men.
I found a few years ago that I didn't need any of those apps that track your period. I had come to understand my body and began to be able to tell, based on my general mood, where I am in relation to my cycle. And, while I love to rant about the terrible mood swings and my almost bipolar behaviour during the pre-menstrual week, my total inability to focus on anything in a concrete way, and my tendency to be even clumsy then, I rarely speak about the utter gorgeousness of the good days, when I am so on the brink of emotion that I can be moved to tears. I feel things with unfiltered passion and feel like a sounding board for the universe's best vibes.
Today was one such day. Returning from the visa application centre in the morning, I took the metro, found a seat in the general compartment next to a man, put on my earphones and listened on loop to Nina Simone's "Wild is the Wind". I remembered the quasi-fated way in which she entered my life, Miss Simone, through the intercession of a Canadian man I was crushing on when I was 20. Nina had been on my mind because I decided I'd go as her for a musician-themed party this weekend. Listening to her contralto voice that always struck me as fascinatingly androgynous and her virtuoso piano skills, I was swayed all over. I felt like I was in heat, but of a more mystical kind; a frenzy that was more transcendent, like when you are moved irrevocably.
If, as women, we're apparently doomed to repeat the same cycle month after month, year after year until we arrive at the fresh hell of menopause, it's perhaps worth recording those occasional and ephemeral moments when you are both hungry yet satiated, yearning yet fulfilled, happy yet conscious of the looming loss of that happiness. Maybe these are what constitute a uniquely feminine experience.
Deliberating on the life and times of Everywoman, Rosalyn D'Mello is a reputable art critic and the author of A Handbook For My Lover. She tweets @RosaParx Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com
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