On Getting Old!

 For the longest time, I’ve appreciated the system in western countries of children moving out of the parents’ home to make their own. So it matters little to them whether they have a boy or a girl because they know both would venture out of the folds eventually, to carve their own niche. Parents are mentally prepared to live alone as they age. 

While in india, the craze for the boy child continues because he is the ‘budhape ka sahara’ and the daughter is ‘paraya dhan’. Businesses crave for an heir, aging parents look upon the son and his children to pass their time with, women continue to make adjustments to suit the patriarchal arrangements. 

I realized the idea had taken roots in me too when we thought of renovating our ancient house and then took a step back, musing why to bother when Seeya would move on to her own home some day. Or when we began to dread old age because there wouldn’t be the constant chatter of children around here to light up the hush quietness of our everyday. 

Too set a bird to mold her ways now. It’s not the age itself that’s scary. It happens quite silently everyday - Fine lines here and there and the absolute intolerance to loud music. Bah! It’s the insecurities that build up along till they feel like a heavy stone placed with a thud over your palpitating heart. 

You’re not young enough to begin again or silly enough to be distracted by a frivolous lifestyle. You’re just there, withering in bodily strength, forgetful in mental abilities and tired by soul. Or at least that’s how the future seems to be when I rise up on my toes to see. What looks beautiful in your thirties, becomes tiresome in your forties and downright fearful in your fifties. 

Tch! And you thought, not looking stunning anymore was the only bother! When G and I look at an old couple, struggling with their bags at the airport or trotting behind a galloping coolie at the railway platform, we rush to help with THAT feeling in our heart. All that pride of youth, almost fringing on vanity, how tragically it begins to melt! 

When would we learn to not hold on to children but propel them to fly away? Aging gracefully and not just in the face. The self love that the new-age keeps harping about, how crucial it is to cultivate it, so that we do not depend on external sources to feel alive and happy. Repeat after me - I am enough. I am blessed. I am happy. And will be. Amen! 

Mars And Venus

 A lot of women have grown up on surreal passion through fiction - movies, books, music, etc. When they actually get a taste of some, they tend to magnify it in their head and words. So the love they think they are experiencing is actually way less and the words they profess of being smitten, are wrapped in ridiculous exaggeration. They want to please. 

So when she says “We’ll be together forever” she’s convincing herself of it, more than you. When she alluded “I haven’t felt like this ever before”, she’s not really lying but creating the romance in her head. Her own little fairy tale. In all probability, sorry to burst your bubble but she’s not actually having a life altering experience. Sigh! 

Whereas men have usually evolved out of practicality. They enjoy the attention and the chase. But gradually they begin to take words at face value and run shit scared thinking the woman has turned them into an object of reverence that they might not be able to prove true on. Men say and forget but remember what the woman says and assume. 

It’s a sorry circle and why many relationships don’t work. Overbearing expectations and hasty assumptions. Romance Vs Reality. If only women knew how to differentiate between what they’re actually feeling and what they want to feel, they’d make all lives easier. 

Also one of the reasons why women seem to be able to move on quicker post a break-up than men. They realize they don’t feel so much once things end but they want to feel that love again. Not really blaming my gender. We just want to escape the monotony that men have grown accustomed to.