Square peg in a round hole

The story of the single girl in the city is one that’soft-told. But the insecurities and anxieties of the single guy, who feels like an odd one out deserves a mention

Right from our childhood, we are told to have dreams and goals and then spend 25 years of our life working towards achieving these goals. Studying in a premier college makes you all the more ambitious about what you want to do for the rest of your life and when you find your true calling, you feel like there’s no stopping you. The burning desire to be successful rages like an inferno, until the day your parents pop the question which you had been dreading since graduation — ‘So, when are you getting married?’. In a country like India, where it’s considered blasphemy to still be single at 30, this question changes the entire equation which you had worked upon so carefully since the age of ten.

Have I been asked this question before? Yes. And my replies have been consistent so far. “What’s the hurry? There’s still a lot of things I want to do, before I think about marriage,” I say, much to the chagrin of my parents. And the moment you realise that most of your friends are falling like a pack of cards in front of this institution, reality dawns upon you that life isn’t the same anymore. You can’t hang out with them like the good old days and imagine the prospect of dealing with loneliness when your friends are living a blissful life after marriage.

There’s no denying that craving for company is on everyone’s mind, but what I don’t understand is why do people get married when they are at the cusp of laying the foundation for the rest of their life and living their dreams. Marriage changes everything and I have seen lots of my friends take a completely different path post marriage because they have to ‘settle’ down in life. Perhaps, their dreams of travelling the world and living a life devoid of responsibilities was deemed to be too risky.

But then, I must reiterate that I am not against getting married. The time lapse between graduating from college and getting married is what bothers me the most. Shyamala Chandrasekhar, who works in a consultancy firm, says,”A lot of my friends began feeling insecure when they saw their friends getting married soon after graduation. It was more about company than the idea of settling down in life. You don’t know whether you can relive the golden moments you had spent with your friends.”It’s quite a tricky situation for guys as well when they realise that their days of

absolute freedom are numbered. When Rajeev, a communications consultant based in Hyderabad, sat together with his friends who got recently married, he began to have mixed feelings about marriage, “ When my friends tell me stories about their life after marriage, I always wonder how they are

able to manage doubled expenses. There is obviously a lot of anticipation, introspection and sometimes people end up having cold-feet. When they narrate an incident involving their wives, I tend to connect it with my own life and think ‘what if I face a situation like this’, because I could be facing a similar issue soon. If not, that incident is passed off as ‘Thank God I’m still not there’.”

Peer pressure to get married snowballs into constant nagging from your parents. ‘Look at your friends. Everyone is getting married and they are all so happy. When are you going to get married?’ they ask, precisely when you are about to say, ‘I am not ready yet.’

Hemasundar Dhavili, an oilfield engineer, concurs, “Honestly it does get depressing, especially if you are single and have almost lost connections with your friends. To cope up, people tend to make new friends at work and take time out to travel and do different things rather than just relying on some get togethers with old friends. There’s also constant pressure from the family to get married just because all our friends are getting married. It’s tough to deal with a situation like this, especially when you are yet to completely understand the purpose of marriage.”

As I sit back and ponder upon the mystery behind this phenomenon, I get an e-mail from an old friend. He has sent me an invitation for his marriage. A sense of depression clouds my thoughts. Why is everyone in a hurry? I sigh and resign myself to this inevitability which will change my life.

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Category: Family & Relationships