“AN” Effect

 Introduction

    AN here is an acronym for Ardha Nari. So, what we are going to explore in this treatise is the Ardha Nari Effect on the protagonist, an ordinary man.

Axiom

    Every man is half-woman. Note the point. It is not that every woman is half-man. There is no concept of Ardha Nara. That is, a woman does not have a man in her (An aside, I wonder why the combative propagators of women’s equality have not taken up cudgels on this anomaly).

The Positioning

    The woman is positioned on the left half. By corollary, man is on the right. That is why woman is said to be the “vama bhagam”, the left side, of man. So, those who think the woman should be right, would be wrong. This positioning is also a point for militant women to take up. But let that be.

Hypothesis

    I, the protagonist, the ordinary man, is made up of two halves. This exposition will try to establish which side is who.

Early Experiments

    As a child this theory of duality in one intrigued me. I used cut pictures of faces into two halves and seek differences. And, lo and behold, the two halves were different. Vastly different. I also cut my own passport size photos and studied. Oh, yes, my right face was not identical to the left. Then I looked more closely at myself in the full-length mirror and observed that every part of the body differed between right and left. The palms, the forearms, the biceps, the rib cage, the legs, the feet, everything. These observations and establishment of the fact that each one of us is made up of two different halves, impressed friends, especially girls, no end, each time I gave discourses. I vividly remember the admiration in the wide, pretty eyes of those girls.

Validation

    Skip the middle life when one, as an Army Officer, had the weight of the Nation on one’s shoulders and thus had no time for such frivolous experiments. Cut to old age. Lot of time to ponder over anything that caught the fancy. And worse, write about it!

    Now there is a sinus problem, on the right side. The right ear seems not in its prime, since my granddaughter declared, “you, tho, granpa, are hard of hearing”. Right side of the neck has a constant, nagging dull pain. Right shoulder, right elbow, right wrist, all have pain, with a swelling on the base of the right thumb to boot (this makes it difficult to remove my “kada”). Right hip is on its last gasp with some pain added. Balms and oils are keeping it from coming apart. Right knee had gone slipping long, long ago anyway. Ever since the left knee had taken the load and supported the right.

    Everyone knows about the left and right sides of the brain. All I can say about me is that, I was weak in Maths but quite okay in Languages, during my days as a student. Therefore (and for more sordid reasons), I am a bit confused about my brain. There is a theory that this left and right business of brain is a myth! Being a man more physical than of brain, (“steel body” as I, myself, describe about me, flexing my biceps to my grandchildren), I leave this particular aspect out from my exposition and leave it to those who are wasting time reading this, to explore.

Deduction

    My left side always “seemed” weaker than the right. I had to deliberately put in a lot of effort and practice to kick the football hard with my left. I tried a lot to write with my left hand with an aim to be ambidextrous, to no avail. Could not open a bottle cap with the left hand. It was always right, right and right. Except of course, in Boxing, where in, the left came up with strong punches which surprised the opponents, to my utter glee. Quite ominous, don’t you think? I mean, my left being associated with a woman?

    But in general, the left had been the anchor for the right to execute the tasks, it has to be admitted. To kick the football with the right, left had to be the anchor. For High jump and Long jump, left leg took the brunt for the right to soar. And so on.

Conclusion

    In youth, my entire right seemed stronger than the left, notwithstanding but more importantly ignoring, the fact that the left was the anchor for the right. Now, with one foot in the grave, the right one for sure, the left seems to stand strong. No pain, no aches. I do not think anyone jumps into the grave; only slips in, right? So, there is no question of any leg anchoring for the other.

    “Vama bhagam” of a man is a woman, “Shakthi” - strength. Thus, it is proven that my underlying strength, my anchor, is that of a woman while the right was only demonstrative, not substantive. Only thing unclear is, the identity of the said woman.

    Thus, the AN Effect exists in my case. QED.

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