A BALANCED MARRIAGE

A balanced marriage....

I was recently at a get-to-gather organised by our community. This was for the sole purpose so that we can find and seek proposals for marriage. Well, being single at 29 and having senior citizen parents often forces you to land up at such places for their sake. So here, I was staring at people around me looking out for a proper proposal for myself. I was walking around the venue when I suddenly came upon a small group discussing stuff. They were discussing about marriage. The basic discussion was about dominance, understanding and love in a marriage.

Being a writer how could I expect myself not to participate in the whole discussion? Therefore, I took a chair and sat beside a beautiful girl (for understanding purpose would refer to her as ‘The girl’ henceforth in the post). The girl was intently listening to discussion. A boy from opposite to me said, “Women these days dominate a lot and men get dominated. It is not right to dominate a man. I mean we boys have a life, we need some space.” A girl from the group immediately said, “Yes right, as if we girls do not have a life and we do not do enough sacrifices. Every boy should tolerate a little dominance. We do not ask for much. We just want to feel like a queen.” The boys in the group were all creating a chaos saying, “As if we boys do not make sacrifices.” In between the chaos, the girl at my side and I were silent and listening. I stood up “Guys, chill all we need is a balanced marriage. Just like a balanced diet.” Everyone was silent immediately. They were silent not because they were impressed by me, but because they did not understand my point. The girl sitting next to me was smiling. She asked, “Could you please explain your point?” I smiled at her. Finally someone intelligent who wants to discuss things, not debate, and create chaos. Another boy said, “Yes please explain it to the girls first they need to understand it more than the boys.” Again a chaos started. This time it was the girls creating the chaos. The girl sitting next to me stood up and said, “Guys if we are just going to create chaos like this we are never going to understand what this gentleman here has to say. Give him a chance to speak first. Just be quiet and listen. Let us all behave like mature beings and not college kids.” I was flattered at the very moment. However, keeping my thoughts to myself I proceeded. “I can explain this much better if you guys can follow me to that garden over there.” They agreed and followed me. The girl I walked with me at the forefront. I asked one boy and one girl to come forward. I told them to sit on the seesaw in the garden. They hesitantly sat on one. Now I looked at the audience, which I now had in front of me and said, “Marriage is like this seesaw. If it is not balanced, there will be no fun. If the girl puts more pressure on the boy about spending time with her, having family time, taking her for shopping or to her mom’s place or keeps dominating him for everything then the boy will never be able to come up in life, just as he will not be able to come up here on the seesaw. He will not be enjoying the so-called ride called marriage he will just sit there passively, while the girl thinks she is on the top of the world when actually she is not. The moment the boy gets agitated and angry he will walk down from this seesaw and the girl will fall right down to the ground and injure her. In reference of life, that injury will be emotional and hurtful forever, leaving scars on your heart.” The girl was now smiling. I looked at her and smiled too. I continued, “I agree that dominance is an inseparable part of a marriage and let’s face it people every now and then there is going to be dominance from either side. The only fun would be if the dominance is balanced.” She again looked at me and said, “Balanced dominance you say?” I spoke again, “Yes a balanced dominance. A dominance, that is positive, and from both sides. Man and woman are huge Ego Stations; both the beings need their egos served with honor. The wife dominates her husband and the husband dominates the wife. Both need to get their share in life. Excess on any side could lead again to the same situation we spoke earlier.” Another girl asked, “Can you give an example?” I started thinking upon an example. I suddenly looked at a balloon seller at the gate of the garden. I bought four balloons from him. I called a boy ahead and told him to blow the balloon. He was blowing the balloon. He stopped at a particular point where he thought the balloon would blow.  I told him to blow more. He blew more and suddenly the balloon blasted. I collected the pieces of the balloon, called a girl ahead, and told her to patch up the balloon. She looked at me quizzically. I took the pieces from her and told her to sit. The girl was smiling she had understood my point. “Guys, marriage is just like this balloon. It cannot take a lot of pressure. Either of you tries to pressurise the other with your dominance there will be blast in your marriage. This blast will be irreparable leading to heartaches. This can lead to the ultimate fatal end of a marriage. However, if you do not excessively blow the balloon, it will never blast. Therefore, stop burdening each other with ego fights, proving points, correcting punctuality, or common stupid causes that do not at all matter.” Everyone had understood my point. “Don’t you think there is a thin line of difference between love and dominance that we often tend to forget, and unknowingly cross the line? That is also bad is it not?  I mean, we have to be careful not to cross the line. We have to love each other but not dominate, do you agree.” The girl said. I smiled. “I agree completely with you.” Someone asked, “Can you please explain to us what she said?”I could have given an example but I wanted to see how she explains stuff. In addition, it gave me a good advantage to flirt with her. “It will be better that she explains it to you all.” I gestured her to come forward. She confidently came forward and told me to give a balloon. I gave her the balloon. She blew it up and told me to tie it to a thread. I did as she asked. She then took the balloon and handed it to a girl. “Keep the balloon with you. Do not let it go away from your hand at all.” She did as the girl asked. “Look at this balloon now. It is nothing but us. Personify yourselves into this balloon. Now, if we love someone a lot and not do not provide him or her enough space, they will never be able to fly high. The reason being the pressure we put on them. Love is just like this thread. It is there to keep you on track; however it also pulls you back if not balanced and expressed in excess from either side, love is to be shared and not only given or taken. It is a two-sided transaction and not one-sided deal. Love each other but give each other enough space to flourish in life.  Marriages are there to help us live life with happiness and not with pressures. If we pressurize each other to be with each other always, then we will find our marriage a burden and not a happy affair. Girls, remember just as you even boys need some time to themselves away from everything. Away from all of their hectic schedules, away from family, some time with their friends, where they can enjoy some time for themselves. They are always busy working hard for the family so that they can give you all the luxuries, happiness, and love. There are many pressures, a boy faces. He too needs some relaxation. If you keep him clinged to yourself, he will surely feel like running away from you. Boys, even you have to agree to this and the same applies for you too. Give the girl some days off where she can be free, she can wear what she wants, go where she likes, be with her friends, away from all the worries about family, her job or business or household chores, somewhere she can enjoy being on a vacation. This way you both would understand the value of each other while enjoying the married life too without any complaints.” I was intently staring at the girl and smiling. I was surprised at her intelligence and her thought process. She had mesmerized me. At any other given day in my past I would have asked her, will she marry me? However, my past gave me huge scars that taught me that I should not be hasty and wait for my destiny to work for me in the context of life. She looked at me staring at her and just smiled. I was startled and looked the other way. At that moment, my eyes could easily reveal my thoughts and I did not want her to read my thoughts. “How do we keep track of so many things? Marriage is a difficult task.” Another boy said. “Yes it is difficult, but it is beautiful too.” The girl and I almost said this simultaneously and then looked at each other smiling. “How come it is beautiful with so many complications?” She looked at me and with her eyes gestured me to speak. I gestured her again with my eyes to take over. She said, “Well, let’s be very frank, all of us here know how we feel when we do not have a friend to talk to when we need them the most. At the age we are mostly, all our friends are married and their priorities have changed. We can no longer, call them at 2 in the night, and talk to them. We need someone close to us to hug us, to hang out with, to look after us in times of our need. Someone...” “Someone, who is right beside us,” I started completing her sentence now. “Someone who can tell us they love us, someone who can make us feel very special, that one with whom we can sit and share a coffee in the night while watching a movie. Someone, who can keep us on our toes for being on time for dinner and who will care for us.” The girl and I both looked at each other and smiled. There were no doubts or questions anymore. The girl and I started walking towards the buffet counters for lunch. We took a plate each. We were silent, until we sat down for lunch at a table. She sat with me. There was no one else to disturb our perfect moment. We introduced ourselves to each other and spoke to each other about our likes and dislikes, about our hobbies and our thought processes. There was something magnetic between us. After we had lunch, we sat there for some more while talking to each other. At 5 in the evening when the get-to-gather was almost at an end, I escorted her to her car. “Hey Kunal, mind if I take down your number. I mean we can be in touch. I would not want to miss an opportunity to talk to you and meet you again.” I smiled. She too smiled. I gave her my number. “Don’t you want my number?” the girl asked. “No, I am confident enough you will call me within the next 15 minutes.” She giggled. After 15 minutes........ “So I guess you were right I did call you in 15 minutes.” The rest is a personal conversation. The story however is yet to finish.