Save thy soul!

I am not against marriage. I am against mediocrity in relationships. 

She may be the person who gets up in the morning to make him breakfast or babies. He may be the one who dutifully fetches groceries and some extra sweets when her parents are around. For many of us the very mention of these things has painted a picture-perfect marriage in our heads. But for me it hasn’t. A marriage is of course doing things for each other but the society does not determine for you what those things are.

But in India they do. They see a single man or a woman and they humor you with “when do we see you married?” “It’s not that difficult to find a guy/girl. May be you’re too choosy!” “How can a pretty-face like you be single?” They never understand when you tell them that you cannot get married for the heck of it; that you need to feel the glow in your heart for someone to be able to say “I do.”

So many of us, especially here in India, get on with a marriage which eventually becomes a routine. You jump onto a matrimony website, find several pictures that call out to you, check out the “About” “Education” “Salary” family details and hit the “Send Interest” button. Not to take away the role of these websites as a space in Cyberia for people to meet, their pseudo-ability to quantify (or filter) compatibility between two unknown people is bizarre and far from reality!

Discussions start, you start liking each other and then bingo! - sooner than you think the D-day arrives. The rites, sights and sounds cloud your mind with happy thoughts. Then from day one start the observations, judgement, expectations and getting to know each other. Since you are already married, the more convenient things to know about your spouse (for those of you who would even make an effort to know) are – what she likes to eat, where she likes to go, what he likes you to wear, and how he expects you to conduct yourself.

By the time the differences begin to arise, we are expecting a baby. Another new turn of events, few distractions and a newfound happiness! Sooner than you can think the room is filled with diapers and feeding bottles.

It’s only a handful who wait for the right one – the one whom they do not marry just because society tells them to. They marry the person who can challenge them, push them to be better, treat them to be equals. They wait for life to carry them on its wings, to make them dance in the rain like kids, to be blown away by every kiss as if it were their first. They have known their share of tears, and live in the same society. But they do not need a marriage to validate who we are. We are complete even without it.

Whereas you probably envy our vacations and our independence. One day you meet that old friend from college, perhaps an ex-flame, and you realize the fakeness of your life. You perhaps meet who you were. You meet your ex-self - one for whom life was a passion not a routine! And you want to claw back in there and find yourself. Or probably you had buried yourself too deep into mundaneness to make much of it. And you carry on – sometimes posting happy pictures of you and your better half on social media, sometimes calling it a seven-year itch, sometimes condoning your extra-marital. And life for you goes on. Do I hear your protest? - “Your life is not so bad.” Well, trust me singlehood is not so bad either. All you have to do is learn to love yourself. 

Nature engineered for you to procreate and carry on with the human race, not for you to become a husband or wife. So until the few of us do not have our hearts stolen, we refuse to be bitten the bug of averageness.