MARRIAGE IS HAPPINESS* : CONDITIONS APPLY

It was not the case that I was fair and lovely in my college days. In my college, no other boy’s face was as distasteful as mine. But the miracles happen in our life, irrespective of our qualifications. It happened in my life, too.

During second year in college, there entered a very good–looking girl in our class. And after her entry in the class the study became second job for us. Visibly wealthy was she, so when her car entered the college premises the whole world of education was used to be dismissed. Everyone looking at her: the girls looked at her car and the dresses she put on, and the boys looked for obvious reasons. We all were true appraisers of beauty. We were experts in the art of gazing, too. And the new entrant was a good object to gaze at.

I am to tell you about the miracle. Miracle happened in my life (though it can be termed as the accident of her life). Being a bookworm, I passed most of my time in library. It was almost like a deserted place. Because all other college friends have several other factors to be engaged: Rajesh Khanna, Sharmilla Tagore, and Hema Malini were the spoilers of education in those days. But I pass my time in the company of Bertrand Russell and Aristotle.

“Hello, I am Sheila. I think you like reading books.” The words came like coming from the strings of a sitar. But it stopped the working of my heart. She was beside me and was willing to talk with me. She, the new student, that girl with car, had addiction of the books, too. Her father was a learned advocate of the city.

The time stopped. But the calendar kept moving. The days turned into weeks and weeks became two months, and we have started sitting in college canteen. We kept visiting parks and sea shore. Fear was a gone factor for me now. She was bold ab initio.

But my friends, my true friends too, were worrying about me. They had reasons to worry. One: I was passing more and more time with Sheila. Two: her father was an advocate, a renowned advocate of criminal cases. Had he known about my ilu ilu with his daughter, had he thought about taking revenge for the same, he would have sent me in an orthopaedic hospital within minutes.

This is the half story.

Today my wife keep telling me that ‘Had I known that you don’t know anything other than reading books, I would have never married you. You spoilt my life. You enticed my father by telling that you would join Law College and become his assistant.’ Perhaps that was the reason for his saying yes for the marriage.

I did not go to Law College, as I got a good job as an officer in a well-known institution. But my wife kept telling me that  ‘There were proposals from the young advocates practicing in High Court. They were good looking, too. But her father was blind.‘ In fact I was blind; think so now. I could not see the sea of hardships waiting for me before proposing her.

The time wheel passed. Due to the legal presence in my home, and as I too liked the study of law, I enrolled myself in a Law College. It was an evening college and I acquired the qualification to practice in the courts. And to satisfy my wife’s hidden desire ‘to be wife of an advocate practicing in High Court’, I opted for premature retirement, at the age of fifty, and started practicing in High Court.

But today she has found out dozens of fresh reasons to fight with me: you care less for me; you come late from the office; you do not use your toothbrush in proper manner, and so on. I still remember my first meeting with her in the college library. The wound is still alive, providing enough pain to me.

(Statutory warning: this is not the story of my own life. I am happy, but so many conditions apply.--Naval Langa) 



(Pictures are from web)