This blog is about one of my long time friend, whom I had met in my earlier days and then lost touch, in fact the remembrance also for a quiet some time till I met I him again in my life in an unexpected time. No wonder we were friends again and even thicker friends than the previous occasion. It is pertinent to mention here that I was not in touch much with the friend who initially was the link in between us.
He was a very soft-spoken, jovial and good hearted friend (still is). He was very good at studies and unlike me a very studious person who used to be the cream of our batch. He was really good at sketches. Even in the diagrams he used to add a personal touch of pencil shades, which when I tried gave me yet another lowest mark in the class. He was very shy towards the opposite sex and I have seldom seen him speaking with the other part of the society. We both happen to be attending a personality development program together which he quit in between. That particular program had a lot of girls, which I suspect is the main reason for him to quit. Long time after the good association in the educational institute, he went in his field of interest while landed in my place, and we tried to stay in touch with each other.
In one such attempt to be in touch, I gave him a call on his mobile. To my surprise I heard a soft murmur of a girl’s voice along with his on the other end. Probably, since my call was from an unknown number somebody seemingly was enquiring who is on the line. I thought that I must be dreaming to hear a whispering female voice along with that of him. Yet I wanted to make sure that I was wrong in hearing so, I began fishing. Just to fish right and tight, I mounted a lot of pressure over him to extract the truth. What I learnt was unimaginable, at least for the friend whom I thought, I knew well.
It was indeed his girl friend’s voice. Nothing stunning, for a male has to settle with a female. I simply could not match the figure of that friend I had in my mind and the one I am having on the phone. Startled. Startled was the word. I was never ever thinking that he would be having such a part in his life. I, as usual, was disappointed with my calculations.
I learned that they were having a steady relation for more than ten years. Guess what, he had proposed the girl when she was in her Tenth standard, and had become a reason for her low marks. Their parents happen to be old time friends and have known each other for quiet a sometime. As a family friend’s son and daughter they both have been dear to the parents but as ‘in-law’, they could not accept. As it turned out to be the parents were not agreeing. Nothing new! But in their case they were not agreeing to each other.
Might be the personal knowledge about each other for a longer time and in the earlier days may have been a reason for refusing each other’s son and daughter as their in-laws. She after having accepted his proposal has been steady with her parents throughout. She very boldly expressed herself in the right time and stood by it. Our friend also, as it turned out to be, kept trying out his own methods of convincing his parents. The tug of war has been for last four years after both got settled up with a job. She was almost ousted from her house and staying in a hostel for the work in different place. Her routine visit to her own home has also not so very pleasant at times. The parents have the best weapon, sentimental torture. Playing with other’s feeling and sentiments to force their way. Her parent has been threatening her of committing suicide, should she try and continue to speak of our friend. This bends few persons while it shapes the good into better person. Shaped into a better person she had resolved that she will marry him, with everyone’s permission. No eloping. Women, when resolve on something, become a strong person and she was strong to stand by her resolution. Surprisingly, our friend who has been trying things from his side in his style had offered to elope with, for which he got lambasted.
After so many years of struggle, things were getting better while one of the relatives of them eloped. Again turmoil and distance in the issue. Interestingly, even when the issue was in full open our friend and she have been visiting each other’s house. If it is in absence of the son or daughter, they have been shown same affection as the earlier days.
Setting things apart, the cause of all the conflict seems to be the EP. BP is curable and controllable while the EP has no end till ‘I’ die. EP is Ego Problem. Some kind of EP. Things are always complicated. When two of my subordinates quarrel with each other, I call them and put them under lot of work pressure together, that they forget each other’s issue and sync together. My organisation has unique solutions for all issues. Unfortunately my organisation is not the way of living for the greater populace of the society. So with the time medicine things get cured.
Recently I met them as 'happily married'. Due to my commitments I happen to have lost the track of their life, which they retracted for me, together. After the eloping episode and the humiliation which that family underwent, there was a long lull period and the parents miscalculated that their son and daughter are back to their control. Unfortunately they got it all wrong and on one fine day the ‘I’ of both parents died they agreed to let their ‘children’ to be happy and to handle their life themselves. I heard that their marriage was postponed twice at last moments and in the third time the marriage took place in a peaceful family function followed by a gala celebration in a hall.
If only the parents had knew their children well the unnecessary humiliation for each other could have been spared. The family would have branched out earlier. After all, it is children’s life which the parents think is ‘their’ responsibility. Yes, it is their responsibility to certain extent. They have the responsibility to grow the children to the stage where the children start ‘thinking’ and ‘deciding’ for themselves. Then is the responsibility of the children to prove that their out of good parents/family and prove that they are worth their salt. If I train somebody and certify that he is good, then I should allow him to prove that he has trained well. Once he is proves, which he would if I certify so, then it is my confidence upon him and me coming true. If the parents have grown me well they should have the confidence that I would not go off the track. It is me who is proving their worthiness my establishing my worthiness.
Moreover the love marriage has its own larger scale advantages. No lectures, but on the very first instance it eradicates the nuances of the caste system in the longer run. It would develop a society full of confident persons. ‘Swayambara’, the older system of marriage had given the right of selecting the life partner to the women. Let us not go an age behind them of forcing a marriage in the name of arranged marriage. Eventually after I die, it is my sons or daughters who have to fend for themselves. Let me not force things upon him for I have to build confidence in him. ‘Give a fish he finishes in a day. Teaching him fishing, he survives ‘his’ life’.