Marriage Mania (Tick Tock)

I’m turning a quarter century old in a months’ time, for my friends it is just another reason to celebrate and for my family my biological clock couldn’t be ticking any faster.

I hail from Lahore, Pakistan. My city has nothing to do with the thinking of my family, it is more of a social pressure aroused by old long lost traditions which everyone complains about but does nothing to put a full stop to.

Most of my cousins were married at the tender age of 18 or 19. I’m one of the mutated cases, who have managed to hit 25 without a kid or two. Two years back I was asked by a bride, “Don’t you feel like getting married?” My reply was, “Um, No marriage comes with a lot of long terms side effects”. After a nervous laugh the bride was lost in her deep thoughts.

I find it unfair that a girl is pushed down the road of commitment at such a young age (a common thing in South-East Asia). Before they learn know themselves they find them-self moulding to the ways of others.

Getting back to me, besides me risking the golden opportunity of motherhood, I’m flawed. I don’t know how to cook, clean, sew, or any of the skills that a perfect bride is expected to know. In addition to the list i speak my mind, i don’t like depending on people and I’m not afraid to pick an argument. Oh, boy I’m doomed and I’m going to end up getting beaten up by my husband if I were not to change my ways.

Another thing that I constantly hear is that they wish for me to find somebody who would understand me. You see after preaching fails, prayers are all they can give. I don’t understand why people find it so hard to believe that you can be happy & content without “someone special” in your life. Why are we always tying the idea of happiness with romance? Maybe, it’s hard for us Disney-Bollywood affiliated society to separate the two concepts.

To me happiness (currently) is getting a tan and perm, “No no no no beta (child) do whatever you want to after you get married”, responds my horrified aunt.

Horrified? Oh yeah, didn’t I mention being tanned is another reason my biological clock is going to tick longer than it is supposed to (since marriage is supposedly easy for girls who are “fair & lovely”)