More Space!
A two- dimensional spacial existence: home and office,
domestic space and official work- place is easy to conceptualize. Public and
private spaces are the third and fourth dimensions of space. Restaurants and
coffee shops, clubs, pubs and discos, bus stops, train compartments, airport
terminals, auditoria, museums, gardens and parks, playgrounds, gyms and jogging
tracks, theatres and opera houses, kitty parties, shopping malls, multiplexes,
libraries and book shops, walking plazas and streets – we are all familiar with
third space but how many have access to truly private space?
Amrita Pritam has talked of a fourth room in the house
that women long for. They are at home all the time and have a limited brush
with third space occasionally. At home too, they are mostly confined to
kitchen. The drawing room and bedroom have their set functions. So what they
covet is their own private space – the fourth room in the house, a dream most
are unlikely to realize.
Automobiles are so popular because, apart from
convenience and flagging status, they give us a tiny bubble of private space on
the crowded roads.
Third space is always so crowded in India that
having access to second space, howmuchever cramped and non- private, is a
blessing. The daily commute from a tiny 1 bhk flat to a tiny, crowed office in
an overflowing train or bus is still a stress buster. Taking up your assigned
spot behind a crowded counter, at an assembly line or fast moving conveyor
belt, at a long office table facing a supervisor or on a classroom platform to
herald a new working day is enough to set adrenalin soaring. How zealously we
guard our work space! Executives fight over its dimensions. A little more, a
little closer to the boss means you are moving up in the hierarchy, make no mistake.
Our table space too, is sacred. We put glass over the table top and insert
photos, calendar, and pictures in between to give it individuality.
Technological advance is currently putting paid to the
pursuit of individual second space. An office need have no real time existence.
A wi fi connection, a laptop and a mobile phone and a virtual office space is
instantly created anywhere. This collapsing of second and third spaces is
surely convenient and makes for efficiency but it also means lack of privacy.
Recently it was reported that American parents are
turning their attention to creating a special, hanging out space, equipped with
home gym and theatre to keep their teenage children at home and prevent them
from loitering about. This, in addition to large space and separate rooms for
each family member and for every purpose. Farm houses as weekend retreats have
caught on amongst our rich too. The idea is to make the first space so
attractive that exposure to third space is minimized. Will it work? Lin Yutang
has said,” Sure, I love my family. I want them upstairs when I am downstairs
and downstairs when I am upstairs.” The desire to be with one’s peers is likely
to eclipse everything else.
Come to think of it, privilege essentially means access
to private space. Own room at home, a separate cabin at office, an old
fashioned box in opera house, a favourite table reserved at a restaurant mean
that you matter.
I started working early and before I understood its
importance, had my own table and chair on a long table with two arms on either
side in a large office. Own table is what I missed most after quitting the job.
The second job offered no possibility of individual space. At tea time, we sat
around two long tables that had been joined together and work meant taking
turns at visiting classrooms for lectures. Tables at college library were few
and were all booked if one reached late. So I joined three outside libraries to
create temporary second space. Of course, there were many others before me.
Though one could not reserve space in a library, readers would regularly put up
“Do not disturb the books” message and achieve the same result. Once a month, a
library staff member would clean out all these accumulated books and then one
could breathe easy, at least for a short while.
At last, after many years, the college allotted me a
separate room. I share it with a colleague who fortunately, is not alive to its
possibilities. The room is at an inconvenient point on the top storey of the
building. Three steep flights of stairs and then a narrow, rather make- shift
staircase must be climbed before reaching it but they only serve to strengthen
my privacy. I have fitted swing doors in the door frame but mostly it is so
windy that I have to close the door and then I am alone! Books, magazines,
paintings, collages, photographs, charts, bulletin boards with clippings and
other knick knacks adorn my room. I read, I write or just look out of the
window gazing at the trees beyond. I am completely at peace and manage to get a
lot of work done.
I am happy to spend time here. The space has magic for me. I could call it my studio. The place has become famous in college. Once a student entered the room and while I was busy with others, he looked at the paintings, photos etc. as if he were in a museum and left quietly!
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