Groundings

Fresh, raw, un-steamed and un-fried groundnuts have an irresistible pull in them. They tempt anyone to pick one and peal and bite. The temptation is impulsive. Humane. Men and women forget status and statures on yielding to it. It has more attraction for a young wife who comes from a village, having born and brought up in a farm house, where groundnut was a major crop. Relishing raw groundnuts had become her second nature. Wherever she finds raw groundnuts being sold, she loses her restraint and hurries to buy. If they are three seeded ones her delight is increased. She did not mind peeling and munching them in public. Her husband being born and brought up in a city has a strict sense of civil manners. It always embarrasses him to see her buying raw groundnuts from uncleanly people and at unhygienic places. Often he tries to control her. But groundnuts are uncontrollable attraction to those who were born and brought up among them. She would smile or laugh with an excuse, brushing aside all his control. He did not restrict her from buying raw groundnuts, but he preferred cleanly washed ones, put up in hygienically sealed polythene covers, bought from regal malls. And he relished only baked or fried groundnuts. She never prefers them. They do not have the commune of earth as that ones bought in open sources. Raw groundnuts in raw backgrounds recall her village; her farm; her skies and her trees. The difference of taste between them ended after a long time. Once the husband was persuaded to taste the raw groundnuts instead of forbidding her .As a test he tasted them. The difference in their taste ended. The husband began to relish the raw groundnuts bought at unhygienic places from unclean people. Yes, he agreed mentally. They have their flavor.