Our 33rd Marriage Anniversary
Ravi Speaks:
Yesterday It Was Our Marriage Anniversary-16th October.
Yesterday on 16th October-I have completed 33 years of companionship with my dear wife and entered 34th year.
It was a real pleasant surprise for both of us when our daughter brought a beautiful ‘Almonds Cake’ with the wording of “Happy Anniversary-Mom & Dad” here at her place in Mumbai, where we had come. But for her efforts we would have normally spent the same day as usual since there have many such occasions in the past where we had even forgotten our Anniversary day-while being so heavily involved with our respective jobs. It is only our children who remind us by celebrating such occasions and make us feel special at this stage of our retired-life.
When two people come together, each with varying backgrounds and views, there are bound to be varied differences of opinions and even non-agreements on certain issues immediately after the marriage. I somehow felt that my wife had already adapted to whatever situation would unfold in front of her in the new place. I still would not forget the very rare sight of my wife joining hands with my mother in the morning house cleaning on the very next day of her married life. I could clearly take inference from such a mindset that she would be matured enough to go ahead smoothly for the time to come ahead.
Her situation was such that I had to be away from her immediately after the marriage serving in Ludhiana and she, being herself a working lady, had to continue at Jammu with her job as well. This way we remained almost away from each other for one complete year and the next year in 1990-October we both got transferred to Delhi and since then have been almost together here at Delhi till date. I used the word “almost” since I was away from my family in between for four years at Amritsar from 1996 to 2000.
Frankly speaking, there has been nothing special which we celebrated except a small dinner outside occasionally on the anniversary days-if at all we could remember. There have been the occasions when so many such anniversary days had come and gone as well and we, being over engrossed in our daily routines, did not even remember such days. It used to be only after such days had passed that we would suddenly remember that such a date was already a bygone.
Since both of us were working so the burden should have been almost equal on our shoulders as far as the works and responsibilities were concerned. But here I would fully give full credit to her for sharing the major burden of the home and children. For four long years, she remained alone, taking full care of the children who were being kept in the creche and she had to take their care single-handedly while being in the service. Coming to agreements over how to raise kids can be challenging, and it often requires a lot of compromise and patience on both sides-but here in my case, it was all borne by her only.
Outstation tours and weekend work cut into time spent together had affected our family as well. Now, after 33 years, I realize that even if you’re busy with work, you still need to dedicate quality time to your relationship. Careers are important to us all, but if one person has a demanding job, with long hours, it puts a strain on the relationship.
Now that we both are retired and have all the time in the world to take the stock of the earlier situations and even pass our judgments on our past happenings-suddenly these anniversaries give a very touching reminder we ought to have celebrated at least such occasions of togetherness in those hard times even. It is the children who are more concerned about celebrating our marriage anniversary and rightly so when we all are together. Now I realize how a person forgets during his hard laboring days the celebrations of such important occasions of life. Because if we see deeply one has to squeeze out and carve out such occasions himself from his over hectic and engrossed schedule to enjoy and celebrate only with his family-otherwise he /she would never get the time for such invaluable moments from this maddening world.
Relationships can be amazing, but they can also lead to plenty of disagreements. Likewise, I might define our relationship as a mix of happy and not-so-happy occasions. Difference of opinions followed with happy frolic-occasions mixed with the reflection of high and low fun times has been the style and stance of our life together-which has made it more wonderful that way.
One of the most important factors where my wife has been matured enough has been her nature of having patience and compromise by which she contributed to strengthening our relationship. Sometimes no communication reaching her about me for days caused a lot of agony and apprehension despite that she managed her calm and dealt with such occasions successfully. I remember, once because of the train shut down in the way I was supposed to reach Delhi by evening but could not reach even till the next day in the late morning hours and till the time I reached she had somehow managed and kept her cool despite having no communication from my end.
Till now I have almost touched all the delicate relationship topics like “How it worked when we both were serving”, “how she brought up children only”, Family-care, Household chores, Communication, and so on for these three long decades.
Now I would like to talk about three main very vital aspects/topics which are concerning husband-wife relationship heavily.
These, according to me, are:-
Money Matters, Mutual understanding and marital relationships.
Let me start with the relationship-which, according to me, has been very supreme. She has been a very good partner in sharing all the responsibilities, understanding the occasions where trying to keep me away from the stressful situations and above all trying not to bother her partner for small petty things. We have reached a stage where the real understanding of each other works more emphatically in handling the day-to-day matters. Even physical age-related problems and taking full care of health are the factors which the partners aim at this stage. I am fortunate that way for her to be very much strong on that front.
Monetarily to date, since she has been herself an earner, she has asked nothing specifically related to her for herself. That way she has maintained an egoistic dominance by never even expressing any monetary shortage and managed her part well in the couple sharing the household and other expenditures. Normally, money is one of the most common things couples fight about. Perhaps unsurprisingly, money is one of the most common causes of relationship arguments. But in my case, she is altogether a different lady on that front.
Finally, the important aspect of disagreement is where I have to give in. Even if I am right and true to my word -she would never agree with me if she had disagreed on some point. Here she would not like to give in easily. If I favor one political party and she is against that-she would never agree to even the pluses of the one where she is against. There is this firmness in proving her point right, even if it is wrong.
With time, the understanding between the husband and wife strengthens so has ours too as a couple. She has become even more caring and possessive about me and my health issues now. This might be the reflection of old age and long-standing companionship, which forces the couple to reach each other more and care for each other more.
I think I have gone slightly from “long to prolong” in giving my inner feeling on this occasion. Let me stop here and through this article, with my wife on this occasion of 33rd Anniversary-all the best and above all a happy, healthy, and satisfying long life in the times to come.
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