NO TITLE

For many of us, the best times in our lives have been times spent hanging out with our friends. Though that kind of fun can last upto a certain time, plain friendship can never invoke the feeling of it-was-the-biggest-day-of-my-life feeling. That feeling can be brought on by a special someone, it could be your partner, spouse, boyfriend or some other object of one’s pointed affection. It is this affection and focused love that we search for throughout our lives.
Here is a typical situation.

A 25 something girl is bored of being single. Her parents are threatening to start seeing. She hates the idea of an arranged marriage. But she cannot see how she can have a love marriage without anyone in the horizon or any means of meeting anyone new with a busy work life. What do you think happens? Someone in office says he likes her and irrespective of the fact that she despised him till then, she starts considering. Or else, nothing like that happens and she finally gives in to the idea of inserting an ad in the newspaper or bharatmatrimony.com. So far so good! No harm done. After the proposals start coming in, there is a problem. A meeting is fixed. She meets the guy. She has no reason to say No. He is decent, but nothing that she would go head over heels for. The painful part is that there is nothing to consider either. Unless you can keep meeting the guy and there is no pressure whatsoever from any party, you can make the decision like you would, if he were some friend of your best friend’s brother. But the situation here is different; itis like the placement day at a good MBA college. Spot offers are used to lock-in the candidate. Now if you think all this sounds scary, let us see this from the guy perspective.

He is a 26 something wondering how all the good girls are taken by ugly excuses for human beings. He is not the type who believes in modern-looking-internet-marriage-brokers. He wants to meet someone, check her out, see if she would mix well with his friends, his mom and if she looks good in different outfits. But the only outfit he gets to see her in is a traditional one lest the girl is judged as modern. Now again, he has no reason to say No or a Yes. He is silently wondering how she will white water rafting with him. But some wiser person tells him that all women change after marriage and he says Yes. Of course, they both realize that it is a great decision they took and live happily ever afterORThey realize they should have taken their time to find someone who really gets them.

Either of these scenarios is possible. The problem is that there is no solution for this age of single men and women. Dating services are looked down upon as desperate measures and women will never get their image tarnished by such things. The solution to their situation happens to be the age old practice of matchmaking. If only, the old uncles and aunties could be replaced by young friends who actually knew the two of them. But that is an impossible thing as very few people know so many people and they are always busy getting to know (other) more people.

So we surrender ourselves to this and hope for the best. You never know your prince charming might just leap across from a matrimonial site and maybe just the person you have been searching all your life. Or he maybe just the same creep you have been avoiding all your life. I wanna keep my fingers crossed.

P.S. I empathize with all those who undergo this. I could be just one of them.