The lame one

She was called langdi(the lame one ). A debilitating affliction in her childhood left her with a twisted spine. She recovered after a prolonged bout of fever to discover that she could no longer straighten up fully. Those days were the dark ages of medical science and no one could actually help her. Fate and destiny decided to be kind to her thereafter and she grew  up with stunning good looks.

A young police officer in charge of rounding up congress crooks(pre independence revolutionaries) took one look at the girl(daughter of the village landlord)and was totally smitten. Love must have been sufficiently blind enough to gloss over the obvious handicap, and they were married. The fairy tale wedding was the talk of the entire district. The  festivities lasted few weeks and the delicacies made mouths water, even when recounted two generations later.

She bore three sons and one daughter (another stunner) to the guy who went on to retire as the SP(superintendent of police). 

They owned a large house in the suburbs of a famous hill town, had two cars in an era where having two bicycles in the house was considered extravagance. 

 The youngest son grew up to be a politician of note . Other two boys fared better. Landing government jobs and pretty brides.
She lost her husband to old age and diabetes, a few years ago. Thereafter , the sons convinced their mother to undergo hip and knee replacement surgeries.With the tenacity brought on by life long hardships, she was up and about on her feet , within days of surgery.
After a lifetime of jabs and ridicule, she stood up straight, looked world in the eye and smiled.
She is somewhere in her seventies now. All grit and resilience, she hobbles around the house in her new walker, teasing her grand children, reprimanding errant servants, her back ram- rod straight.
She is no longer the lame one.