Sunday, December 5, 2010

Skip to Happily Ever After..



An old man and a woman stayed over at our place for about a week. After my initial discomfort over having guests, I began to enjoy observing them making themselves feel at home. The husband, a doctor in his younger days has now been reduced to an almost emaciated bag of bones and his bald head popping out of his T-shirt makes him resemble a handsome version of a human turtle! He has a quiet demeanor, yet nothing prevents his old wrinkled face to break into a childish smile, at the slightest inclination.

His wife a younger lady, distinctly fatter and healthier than her husband, has the air of a woman who knows it all ..and NO spec of information seems to pass by her without her having scrutinized it completely! While she is loud, initiating conversations and instances from her life her husband quietly listens and occasionally embellishes the story narrated by his wife.

Looking at them I cannot help wondering how a couple as varied as themselves managed to live a whole lifetime together! The wife is endlessly meticulous, while the husband tends to be lost even with a map in his hands. Makes me wonder, can a politician marry a writer and live happily ever after.

Or is it merelythe pressure of Living Happily Ever After?

Almost all our Lady Bug fairy tales ended with these very lines. No matter what troubles are faced, what hurdles aught to be overcome, in the end everything tends to merge into a happy concoction  of  the Happily Ever After.

 No matter how diverse or similar a couple is to each other, the bond between them seems to emerge out of the mutual respect that they share. And it is this bond that should be treasured and preserved rather than our obsession to see our near and dear ones dress up as brides and grooms and gleam at the cameraman!