He Came to the House
He didn't wait for you to go to him. He arrived, usually a week before a wedding or a festival, sometimes just because your mother had called, and he sat cross-legged on the floor of the drawing room or the verandah with his tin box of chalk, his scissors, and a measuring tape that had gone soft at the edges from years of use. The darzi was not a stranger who took your size. He was someone who already knew it.In most Indian households that kept a family tailor through the 1970s, 80s, and into the 90s, the darzi held a particular kind of authority. Not social authority, he sat on the floor, he was paid modestly, he ate in the kitchen if he ate at all. But the authority of the person who has watched a family's bodies change across decades. He knew your mother's blouse measurements before and after each pregnancy. He knew your grandmother's back had curved. He knew your father had put on weight at the waist but refused to admit it, and he added the extra inch without saying a word.
