Actually it went pretty well yesterday. The girl had that spark, that spirit – that I look for in any person and find in so few…
We had quite a cheerful time with me cautiously making jokes (never know when jokes can misfire with people we dont know comfortably yet!) and it looked like every one was happy.
Later on we got some privacy where she spoke about her interests and things like that – I let her speak
before talking about myself.
Later I asked her my worst concern about getting married – that – I’m usually a VERY simple man… a
lot of women have a lot of dreams of living in mansions and having plenty of cars and so on and I’m
not interested in pursuing such lines. I may have a car, I may be building a house – but thats all just by
luck that I got so much of money inspite of not having struggled for it – and I was equally happy even in my simple one room flat in Germany. She told me she was not the materialistic type herself, as long as she was in an independent and self-sustaining position having a house of her own and that was quite reasonable I think.
She was quite interested in her subjects and will be studying in Belgaum for another 1.5 years before
finishing her MDS – dental science.
Overall I found her to be quite a peaceful girl who achieves what she wants to do without getting
distracted by unnecessary things – for eg she had to forgo a really good army job to continue with her
masters.
My mother liked her very much, but we have to wait to hear back from them.
One mistake I mightve made is earlier my mom had said “my son is a very good boy, he dosent drink, smoke, or have any bad habits” and I had joked “not in front of my mom atleast”
But later in the room, I told the girl that I used to drink but it never caught on to me and I gave it up
just out of simple common sense than any strong willpower, since I could clearly see it as a
ridiculous concept.
Later on when I discussed some of the conversation with my mother and related this part – she berated me that this was totally absurd, because the reality was the quantity I have actually ever drank was really negligible… but the statement “I used to drink” can be interpreted in any way even leading to an
assumption that I used to be a heavy drinker, and old habits might return some day.
But this is just an assumption, but my mother took it very seriously and got very upset – she kept on going on and on about it as if the marriage was all finalised and something catastrophic had happened at
the last moment! Finally I too lost my patience, I told her – its ok leave it to me – in that situation I
happened to feel like saying it – dont expect that I have to come out of the room and ask you every 5
minutes whether its ok to say this or that!
Of course that didnt improve the situation and only made her more upset, but in her anguish she told me
some things that she had been hiding from me – about some incident for which she was sure that “I did not care for her or need her any more and her life was not worth living”. Now atleast I could get a chance to clear THAT up… otherwise I would never have known!!
In software we put so much of effort into a project of say 6 months, and then we so much want it to be
succesful. But if the manager instead of appreciating us abuses us and points out all the mistakes, we feel
so terrible and worthless.
But for parents, their children are like life long projects. So the effect of children talking back to
them is much more magnified for them – and esp since my father expired, I’ve always tried quite hard to
keep my mother happy, inspite of her posessiveness.
But nowadays I sometimes feel like giving up – no matter what I do – how often I tell her how important
she is and esp what she has contributed to so many people and me, how much she has enjoyed her life and so many things she is really privileged to have… all facts… (for example our 2 storyed house when people have none, her good health when other people of her age are bedridden, her daughter who is prospering in the US, her son who respects her whereas we hear countless stories of children throwing their parents out of their houses and bugging them to death for property and so on) …she only focuses on the problems and limitation and why she has to suffer so much, and she always finds some or the other reason to feel “worthless”!!
I find that she’s peaceful for lesser and lesser times nowadays. Its very rare that she ever sits for more
than 10 minutes in total calmness. Yesterday I took her to Sankey tank – theres a nice walking track
around it – where for a change she was calm and happy for 5 glorious minutes looking around and commenting on how cool the wind was and things like that. But as always, within maximum 10 minutes – she remembers something or the other that she simply HAS to worry about.
The television – is like a pacifier – she watches these pathetic sobbing serials endlessly one after
another (though nowadays luckily the quality seems to have improved). She says they are all very intersting and informative and her only source of entertainment (especially the ones where the son ditches his mother after he gets married!!) Sometimes I feel the TV is almost no different than alcohol or drugs.
Can you imagine, yesterday at some point she told me that she was sure that she *expects* me to fight with my sister for property after my marriage! I felt that reflects on the level of understanding she has of
me… though I just left it, what is the point in arguing about such absurd speculations.
I suppose this is the effect of old age catching up with her. I think she has often felt this way, even
since decades ago, but she has rarely found people to discuss it with. Atleast I’m happy that for a start
she is starting to feel free to talk about these things with me even though I cannot really offer any
solution 🙂