Bumped into S’s mum yesterday. Over the next 20 mins or so, the conversation was of course about S. ‘Kya hoga uska…’ muttered aunty while staring into space. Her naani, who has to eavesdrop whenever any friend of S is around, sighed audibly.
It’s always like this. S is 28, attractive and working with a business publication. She’s doing very well according to us (her friends) but is the source of constant agony to her parents as she refuses to get married, especially go through the arranged marriage routine.
I tried to tell aunty that she’s doing wonders with her work (she’s been promoted recently, salary hike, et al) but aunty was on her own trip. ‘Beta…yeh natural nahi hai. Why is she being so stubborn? Why isn’t she settling down…’
Why is the Indian mind so demanding? It starts with parents exhorting children to do well in school, get through a good college, get a degree, then get a job. You do all that, start moving up the ladder and earning well but they (parents, maasis, uncles, even some people from your own generation) are far from satisfied. You need to get married. The thing is, even if you do that, the demands, the expectations don’t stop. Now that you are married, you must have your own house, own car and of course, your own kid. Unless and until that happens, the story isn’t complete yet.
According to a friend of mine with a kid of her own, the story isn’t complete even after that. You need to get baby no. two to keep baby number one company, you insensitive parent, you!
Seven of my closest friends aren’t married. One of them is a guy who works with a bank, gets paid decently and leads a happy, carefree life. He doesn’t ask anyone about minute details of their lives but others are really bothered about his ‘wifeless’ one. The other single friends are girls. One of them is a CA and holds a top-notch job with a finance consultancy, the other is S, whom I have described abive. A third works with a popular magazine, has her own flat in Pune and is a happy, contented soul. The fourth one is the top boss where she works. The fifth one has just moved to corporate from journalism and doing very well, touchwood. The seventh is working with Delhi’s number one paper. To me, they all look as ‘settled’ as the word suggests. But I guess the world at large demands more.
The reason for this rant…can’t forget what S’s mum was going on about. And can’t forget what some people often lecture me about. Settle down? Will somebody please define this magic term? What is settling down? Is it buying a house? Getting married? Getting a job that let’s you do both these things? Staying in one city? Producing a baby? Getting the baby married? Going to phoren? Marrying boy from phoren? Making moolah? Marrying Michael Jackson?
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