Pre-Engagement Jitters

Im so sorry... I havent had the time or the inclination to write, and now that so many thoughts and fears and worries have been crowding my brain, Im suddenly grateful to know that I have a little space on the web on which I can express all my many confusions, once which I have been guilty of ignoring and taking for granted, and an (mostly anonymous) audience of readers, who care about me enough to read and try to understand what I have to say, leave comments, and even email me personal anecdotes to help me out. And I cannot thank you enough and apologise that Ive ignored you too long.

It's kinda time for me to count my blessings, I think, thats why the profusive emotion. I'm sorry if I'm embarassing you - public displays of emotion can be discomfiting in the least, if not embarassing and annoying, even if sympathy is a major element involved in the audience's perception. God, Ive missed writing!

It's just... a few issues between my fiance and I in the past week had got me thinking about whether this was the right choice for me and him, given that though we share a great bond and are very attracted to each other, we are people of very different understandings, and from very different familial backgrounds and upbringings, even in terms of religion and values and the importance of independence, even though, in terms of social status, material and education background, we have similar lives. And I suspect the onset of my PMS has heightened my fears to some degree, and ive been wondering if it really is the little things that will accumulate and drive me crazy and ruin my marriage.

Ive just been building it all up in my head - little things like not eating eggs, even outside, saris, respect, wording things differently, my status changing from a daughter, in which I can wake up late, wear skimpy shorts in the house and whatever I want outside, lie in bed and watch TV, be on the net all day, only to be called for meals, go out whenever I want, sulk and yell at my parents, read, sleep and wake whenever I want, have a fixed routine, can skip familial responsibilities on the excuse of work, hang out and say whatever I want to my grandmother and aunts, drink with my parents, to being a daughter in law, being careful about what I wear and how I present myself, being tactful, having no fixed schedule except the needs of my extended family, having to wear saris and touch people's feet and not drink, to cook and clean and organise and work. What if I dont go to the gym while settling down and get fat? What if no one likes me? What if I have to say and do certain things I dont believe in, that i resist, because doing them would be in opposition to, and hence in some way undermining the way my parents live and have brought me up? What if we dont agree on how to bring up kids and what theyll study and wear and who they'll date and whether they'll have sex? What if I'm unhappy and my husband wont take my side? What if we dont communicate effectively? What if I'm not respected and expected to change all the time? What if when we go to Udaipur for jatra, we only go to Kesariyaji and not Shrinathji and Eklingji also like I do with my family just because theyre a different religion? What if my judgement of the clothes that are appropriate, the things I say or do isnt right and I'm put down by my husband and land up not only making him look bad, but also myself, his family, and mine? what if, as a result of his various unhappinesses in me, he cheats on me? What if I'll never be enough?

And even though these things all sound silly and little, I think, Am I strong enough to handle all this? Am i mouldable as a daughter in law should be? Am I a doormat? Will I be able to stand up for my family and my values and self-respect? Im scared Ill change and as a result turn passive-aggressive and bitter, or if I manage to hold my own, be touted as the rebellious black sheep. Im scared of compromise, of change, of proving myself. Ive never had to. Im scared of having to earn the privileges which are dependant on my fulfilling of my responsibilities - privileges which will have been my erstwhile default state of being (whats the phrase here? that I always took for granted - my fundamental freedoms) - things that were previously seen as basic necessities to my survival as me, the little stupid things stated above, will become luxuries.

Im so scared of that. Im not sure I can fight. And then I wonder why i feel Im in this alone. And my fiance does a fantastic job of comforting me, but Im just so scared Ill let everyone down. Everyone's always filled my head with ominous phrases about the girl having to adjust more, that i just dont think I can do it. The thought of it makes me feel like a noose is pressing tighter around my throat, and I keep looking around for little chips of rebellion that I can hold on to, to survive - that even in cowardly hiding, there will be some essence of silly Joya remaining, even though it may be hidden from public view. Im so scared Ill be compelled to become some Stepford Wife-type invisible automaton, and while their perfectness is something I can only aspire to possess, I almost dont want to out of rebellion.

I think in that sense, my problem is, in the theological sense, my ego. Im so used to being princess of my domestic domain, that Im not sure I want to be the chattel. And that Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham soap opera about that Mansukhlal's joint family's advertising hoardings scare me even more, which their taglines "Kya sanskar ke matlab hai badon ke isharon par chalne?" (Is the meaning of values pandering to the wishes of the elders?) with the daughters-in-law moving as marionettes on strings manipulated by the father-in-law. If Im being the one who has to change conspicuously more, I think Id feel horribly resentful, and make life correspondingly hell for my poor family-to-be. And im scared of that. I know its important for everyone to be flexible, but Im only flexible when others are also willing to be. Im scared Ill marry and then everyone will turn into a monster, and Ill also either turn into one or a shadow of my former self. Then I snort at the thought of my fear of losing my identity when Im not even sure what my identity is now.

Marriage has never seemed to be to be some sort of liberation to me (yeah - Id think immaturely as a teenager, that I couldnt WAIT to get married to get away from my parents stupid rules and shoutings, and now Im being faced by a far more stringent set of rules!). Ive always seen it as terribly boring, one routine after another, predictable and constricting in its monotony. Ive always dreamed of a partnership in which we'd be alone in some kind of Utopia, happily self-realising and experiencing a conspicuous, gloriously-renewing sense of fulfilment daily. Yeah, its kinda hard for reality to match up.

And then i met my fiance. He is like the teenage boyfriend I never had - we make each other laugh, he opens up and talks to me, I can get away with all the nonsense chatter i cant with anyone else, when he kisses me I go woozy, when he looks at me appreciatively I get a bit klutzy. And yet, I was scared that maybe it takes more to make a marriage. Thats why I resisted so long, before I squeezed my eyes shut, crossed my fingers, and leapt into his arms. See, I had been constantly looking for a sign. People tell you, even in arranged marriage, that you just KNOW. What nonsense, let me tell you. I spent days and weeks waiting for a 'spark', to let some warm and fuzzy sensation fill me with certainty.

Instead, I got some vague aching when he wouldnt come online, I'd jump to the phone and squeal silently when he called, as much as I wasnt sure I liked him, I needed to be sure that he'd like me, and Id spend the night wondering if he'd be around the next day, to know he was sure. And he was. And then it hit me. When I worried myself to tears when he wouldnt message that he had reached home safe, when I was silently and gradually hyperventilating that his family didnt like me when I knew I shouldnt really be caring since I didnt want to get married anyway, when I missed him when I couldnt contact him, when he'd quietly take me and place me back in the equilibrium of our world when I teetered towards impossibly melodramatic and rather psychedelic Kodak-Eastman technicolour extremes with a few soothing words of a husband in my teenager-boyfriend's voice, when his unhappiness with me could drive me to new lows, and his pleasure in me to higher-pitched squeals that I can actually express around him (and NO! not in the way you're thinking!), I thought, maybe THATS the sign.

And I know Im discounting the importance of familial support in an arranged marriage. What ive previously seen as pressure and interference, could very well be the rock. It seems like an unsteady premise, certainly, but like God, the Family has brought us to it, and will se us through it. In the Indian setup, we're only two players enacting out own separate drama. We are a only a part of the whole, near enough to the core, that, like baby animals in a herd, need to be protected by the collective of elders, from predators.

So I spoke to my fiance and soaked a tissue, spoke to my mother and soaked 3/4th of another, and am now drained (hehe, pun intended) and a bit calmer. Here I am, writing about fears my mother says are normal, and which I hope for my and my future husband's sake, are. He makes everything worth it right now, and I sincerely hope he will continue to, and I also hope that one day he will say the same for me. I only hope the road isnt too hard and our attitudes too sucky.

My fiance thinks I think too much and it messes with my head. You better not agree!