Chapter 6 Chapter 4 Becoming a Husband

Around the time I was married, there used to be pamphlets worth a paise or a pie (I don't remember exactly how much now) that were published, talking about conjugal love, thrift, child marriage, and other similar issues.Whenever I came across such a pamphlet, I read it carefully from beginning to end, and I had developed a habit of forgetting my evils and doing my own good.What these pamphlets talk about as a husband's duty to be faithful to his wife throughout his life is etched in my heart forever.Besides, I have a passion for truth in my nature, so there is no question of deceiving her.Besides, she was still young at that time, and there were very few opportunities to be unfaithful to her.

Yet faithful instruction has its ill effects.I said to myself, "If I must be true to my wife, she must be true to me." This thought made me a jealous husband.Her duty to obey easily becomes my right to her fidelity, and to do this I must be very careful about my rights.I have absolutely no reason to doubt my wife's chastity, but jealousy needs no reason.I must keep a constant eye on her movements, so she must not move without my permission.This sowed the seeds of constant quarrels between us.This restriction is, of course, tantamount to imprisonment.What's more, Kasturbai is not a woman who endures this kind of practice.She was determined to go wherever she liked, and the more I restrained her, the more she moved freely, which distressed me the more.Not speaking to each other became the situation of our child married couple at the time.I now understand that there was nothing wrong with Kasturbai acting in disregard of my restrictions at the time.How could an innocent woman bear the restrictions of not being allowed to visit temples or see friends?If I have the right to limit her, doesn't she have the same right to limit me?All this is clear to me today.

Yet at the time I had to exercise my authority as a husband!However, readers are not to be misled into thinking that our lives are miserable.The reason why I am so harsh is entirely out of love.I want to call my wife an ideal wife.My ambition is to have her live a pure life, to learn from what I know, to make her life and thoughts as mine. I don't know if Kasturbai also has this ambition.She is illiterate.She was simple, self-reliant, hardworking, and, at least to me, taciturn.She had no qualms about her ignorance, and I don't remember if my incessant learning ever stimulated her to want to learn as much as I did.So I guess my ambition is one-sided.My love is centered entirely on one woman, and I want it to be reciprocated.However, even if it is not reciprocated, it will not be painful, because at least one party has passionate love.

I have to admit I like her a lot.Even at school I was always thinking of her, and the nightfall and the meetings that followed haunted me.Separation is intolerable.I often chatted with her, which kept her awake late at night.In this greedy love, if I don't have a burning sense of responsibility, then I will either die as a victim of the disease, or fall into a life that cannot bear the burden.However, the assigned homework had to be done every morning, and I couldn't lie to anyone.It was this last point that saved me, otherwise I had fallen into countless traps. As I have said, Kasturbai was illiterate.I'd love to teach her to read, but sex doesn't give me time.Because the teaching had to be done against her will, and only at night.In front of the elders, I dare not be with her, let alone talk to her.At that time, and to some extent, even today, Katiahua has its own unique, useless and barbaric purdah system.It can be seen that the environment at that time was not good.So I must admit that when we were young, I tried to teach Kasturbai, but most of them were unsuccessful.And when I woke up from my erotic dream, I was already engaged in public life, leaving me even less time to spare.Later, I tried to get a governess to teach her, but I also failed.As a result, now Kasturbai struggles to write even a simple letter, and can only recognize a few simple Gujarati characters.I dare say that if my love for her had never been tainted with lust, she would be a very learned lady today; because then I could restrain her habit of not learning.Now I understand that for pure love, nothing is impossible.

I have said that one circumstance more or less saved me from sexual disaster.One more thing is also worth mentioning. Numerous examples have convinced me that God will eventually save people with pure motives.Although the Hindu society has a cruel custom of child marriage, there is another custom that, to some extent, reduces the evil of child marriage.Parents do not allow young couples to live together for a long time, and child women spend most of their time in their natal homes.The same is true of us.That is to say, in the first five years of our marriage (from 13 to 18 years old), we lived together for a total of only three years.We spent half a year together so rarely that her parents called her back. Calling her from her mother's house was very unwelcome at the time, but it saved us both.When I was eighteen, I went to England, which amounted to a long and healthy separation.Even after returning from England, we rarely lived together for the first half of the year, because I had to travel between Rajkot and Mumbai.Then came the call from South Africa, and by then I was quite free from sexual entanglements.