What’s the deal with marriage? The way parents sometimes talk to their children with respect to marriage, this is how it sounds to me; You’re 8 yrs old and going shoe shopping with your parents. You don’t find shoes that fit you, so your parents just buy you a size bigger. . . eventually your feet will grow into them. . .well news flash, you’re not a child anymore! Your feet don’t really grow anymore and any shoe that doesn’t fit will not no matter how long you keep it. . .

Marriage is at some level a bit of a gamble if not a mystery. . .we live in a society where most parents don’t talk to their children about sex, marriage and things like that. . .but when ‘the time comes’, they just expect you to plunge headlong into one. . .and manage to float, do freestyle and manage a perfect butterfly stroke! I beg to differ with the notion that knowing how to cook and clean and being a virgin* (check footnote ) are prerequisites enough to ‘get a good boy’ and more importantly, sufficient to be ‘prepared’ for marriage. . .going on a slightly different tangent, I was just pondering upon the number of women who might be undergoing marital rape all over India and how many of them actually realize and have been made aware of the fact that their body is not their husband’s property and that a forceful intercourse, even by the husband is still a violation and they need not take it lying down (sadly, literally. . .). Getting back on track, I’ve nothing against arranged marriages, in my opinion, a love marriage stands just a wee bit more chance of surviving more than an arranged marriage because knowing a person is one thing; living with the person is something else altogether. . .so it’s not significantly ‘better’ or ‘worse’. . .

No man, or woman’s perfect. . .the success of a marriage or any relationship does not depend on perfection. . .it depends on how much the relationship matters to you, how much you’re willing to do and also, what imperfections are acceptable to you as an individual. . .for instance, you could be an organized person, who has a place for everything, now it depends on whether or not organization’s so important to you that you simply cannot live with a disorganized person. . .or is it something that you can limit to yourself, your house and well, occasionally nag your partner to do and do it for him sometimes if he wishes etc etc. . .

The patriarchy in our society’s so notorious, it’s not funny anymore as to how it exists, in subtle if not blatant forms. I’ve seen people pass comments when they see women smoking and drinking and even more commonly, commenting about women hanging out with their guy friends. A woman who smokes or drinks is immediately branded as being immoral, irresponsible, promiscuous and with no sense of familial and social responsibility. These same people, especially women, barely bat an eyelid when a man does the same. I never judge a man or woman for drinking or smoking, so long as he or she does so without disturbing and harming others. If at all you judge a person for that, at least be consistent in doing so! If smoking and drinking are ‘wrong’, they’re wrong for both a man and a woman. . .another example of this kind of judgement passing is with respect to divorced women. . .if a woman is divorced, some people just assume that it was the woman was not ‘good enough’. . .

When a girl is spoken to about how her marriage should be, her mother often tells her about how she’d have to ‘bend’ if not strictly ‘obey’ to have a ‘peaceful’ marriage. . .society makes tall claims about marriage being a union of two equals, but this is what happens. . .a woman is told that she’d have to ‘meet halfway’ with her husband with respect to difference in opinions but in reality is expected to go almost all the way; a guy on the other hand is seldom told any such thing and therefore seldom pressured with expectations of ‘holding the marriage together’. . . people seem to have forgotten their Math! Meeting halfway for a woman means reaching the 99^th percentile! I’m not generalizing, not all men and mothers are like that. . .there are many people who are quite broad minded with respect to such things. . .I’m talking about the rest of them. . .

Above all this, the reasons behind marriage often appall me. . .marriage should not have to be 'the next logical step' or 'I'm done with my studies and I don't intend to work so to pass my time and for living expenditure, how about I get married' or 'I want sex and babies and marriage gives me both with social approval'. . .it should happen because you've found a person you want to spend the rest of your life with. . .even if it is arranged, you should not marry a person because you think you can live with the person your parents chose for you, it should be because you CAN'T live without this person. . .I respect men and women who can think such things through. . .there's nothing wrong with being a housewife or giving up your career, it should be for the right reasons, like a personal choice of wanting to focus on your family etc. . .not because it's one of those many things that people expect you to do. I hate the use of the word 'should' but nothing else seems to fit here. . .

This post is not about feminism per se, it’s more about choices and fallacies to say the least. . .it’s not even as much about being broad minded as it is about giving people breathing space and allowing them to decide how their life should be, both men and women, because men are sometimes just as pressurized to get married as women  are.

Well, what the hell did I achieve out of putting up this post? I mean not many read it so why? Getting my views across, assimilating my own thoughts? Ah, I don’t know. . .I just hope it makes one introspect and makes for a good read and not a long, boring one. . .

 * Conditions apply. . .only on a women.