The ‘new’ life sure is eventful! These days each hour brings forth a new lesson. Its fun, exciting, overwhelming, exhausting, upsetting all at once.

Everyone around me is so excited and helpful. Be it teaching you the easiest routes or sharing tips on best restaurants or salons, I see every one going out of their way to pitch in. There are endless invites to lunches and coffees. There are genuine attempts to being friends. There are  constant efforts to provide me all I may need. I have obviously never experienced so much attention ever before but isnt that a two edged sword? As much as I love it it means getting used to its side-effects.

Earlier if your mother cooked 3 different dishes for dinner, you would ignore one without thinking twice……just ‘coz you didnt feel like eating it. I do that now and am faced with (well-meaning) questions whether I dont like it, whether I dont eat it ever, whether the cook should never make it again. Chances are I probably didnt think twice and may not even have a reason for ignoring that dish.

Where once I would sit in my room all by myself for hours spacing out on music, now I realise it may worry the others whether I am bored or missing home. Where once I had the room to myself at the end of the night, I now am learning to share my space with another person. Where once you could easily seek the comfort of your best friends’ company, now either you are too busy to take the call or its not a good time for them to talk.

Where once I could bravely face any sarcastic, mean, angry comments and give back what I got, now there are times when the simplest and most innocent of comments tear me up. The Boy’s sister gave me a piece of advice; hear what others have to say from one ear and take it out from the other…..dont let anything go south (to your heart) for the first year of the marriage. Obviously I am not doing a good job of following her advice and take everything too personally.

A friend put it well recently. Everyone will have an opinion to share and they will do so gladly. Every one will tell you what you should be doing but no one shares the important bit on how to do it. I have realised that weddings and marriages brings out the pop-psych in everyone There are endless suggestions on strategies to deal with the husbands, the inlaws, the neighbours, the pets! I think what works best though is to just smile and go with the flow. Its different but I guess the key is to enjoy the difference and treat it like an adventure.

Every now and then, there is a gesture or an effort that makes you fall in love all over again…..that makes you feel like you belong……that makes the slightly harder days worth it all.

Yup! Its time for yet another change. I am now ticking the “married” box instead of  the “single” box on forms!

Some friends made it while some were missed terribly. We sang, we danced, we drank, we ate and partied really hard. It started days before the wedding and just kept getting better through the wedding days. Some of it still continues. Like I keep telling The Boy, I cant remember the last time I hit the bed before midnight. Its been months!! Now that the euphoria and chaos of the wedding is over, our bags are packed again as we are off for a (well-deserved!) holiday.

Its been a rather roller-coaster ride so far. Sometimes, it feels like I belong and yet sometimes the creaks of the bed, the sounds from the street below, the taste of drinking water…….everything seems so foreign. Its a new city and for now, dealing with it is on hold. ‘Coz frankly, all I can think of are the un-interrupted and fun-filled days in South Africa with The Boy!

I think I am finally getting a hang of it….being pampered and spoilt This whole getting married thing does have its upside!

I can count the number of times I have gotten a pedicure/manicure on one hand. The idea of me relaxing while some girl at the parlour did all the hard work didnt sit well with me. Blame all the waxing and other painful procedures where you contribute (your pain) to the process of looking good. Also, call me strange (not to my face though) but I have never learnt how to relax with someone else touching my body. It might also explain why I am not too fond of hugs either. But I have now subjected myself to a couple of body massages and am starting to enjoy it!

Apparently, these massages are rather mandatory for an Indian bride. My ‘masseuse’ and certain cousins inform me that I am too late, that this process should have started a long time back. All this was accompanied with a bit of eye rolling that made me wonder whether I had no hope left to look good for my own wedding. It took me a while but I must admit I relaxed and totally enjoyed it. I had to bite back my sighs and moans of pure bliss and contentment lest I scared the masseuse away. So….I get to have this every week for the next month. What joy!

I have also noticed that for some reason, no one in my house seems to want to wake me up in the morning. On a couple of occasions in the past month, I have found myself sleeping till noon (during the weekday!!!) The mother, who since I quit my job hated if I woke up after 9 am, is suddenly not hovering around my bed.

And did I mention that a casual remark about how I’d love to eat a certain dish results in its appearance at the next meal? Like I said, I am soooo getting used to this! Maybe I could fill up the 5 month gap on my CV with ‘worked on honing the art of being spoilt!’

………..are never-ending.

Especially if you have one like mine, that tends to completely wipe itself out.

They were showing the movie, ’Message In A Bottle’, the other day on TV. I know I had watched it years and years ago but I had absolutely no recollection of the scenes as I watched it again. I had a very hazy memory of the storyline but wasnt sure how it all played out. At the same time, I also kept having this feeling that I should not be watching this movie…….that there was a reason why I shouldnt be except the reason had been erased by my mind!

So I stayed up watching it when I knew there were 1300 other things (of course related to the wedding) that I could be doing instead. I am way too curious for my own good and I just needed to know how it would end. When the end of the movie did roll in, I knew why I shouldnt be watching it. The end just about broke my heart.

I hate sad endings in movies! If only my memory had served me well, I would have recalled that this movie had a sad ending and not continued watching till the end and felt sad and heart-broken. **sigh**

……my sense of humour!

I think I am losing it with every passing day that brings us closer to the wedding. There are hazaar things to be done and we have only a couple of months left. Its not the long list of tasks that worry me. Every time I am asked yet another question I lose it a little. Every time I am asked for my opinion or suggestion I sigh deeper now. The discussions are getting longer, the demands are getting stronger. I also realise that everyone has a different idea and plan. Each time this difference is highlighted I lose it a little more!

I miss excel sheets and crazy deadlines. I think I might even miss my bitchy boss a little now. But most of all, I miss my sense of humour. **Sigh**

A’s last post is partly responsible for this post. She talked about the ‘art of giving gifts’  

There is something special about giving gifts. Most of us probably share similar behaviour when we give gifts. Part of us is excited and happy because we are doing something special for someone. Most often, (unlike cases mentioned in A’s post ) we think about the person, their needs, the occassion, make an effort to find the perfect gift……so a part of us is also quite pleased with ourselves. We await eagerly for the other person to react to it and hope that they like the thought, the effort and the actual gift.

What happens then when someone gives your gift a very lukewarm response? You feel disappointed. Do you ever wish, though, that the other person had atleast pretended a little harder to like it? Do you ever wish that even if they never used your gift and it lay in the dark corners of their cupboard for eternity …….you were okay not really knowing about that?

I presume you do.

Over the years, I have received gifts that I havent truly liked but other than on this post, I dont think I have ever admitted that to anyone. I get so excited that someone thought of me, at times overwhelmed or just happy to receive a gift (what can I say, Im easy!) that I could never disappoint someone by admitting I didnt like it. Now you wonder what is it that I do with these gifts? Do I push them into the dark corners of my cupboard for eternity? Uhm, yes……and yet they do see the light of the day now and then….like when the ‘gifter’ is around. Have you ever seen the joy on someone’s face when they realise you are using what they gifted you? Its a look mixed with emotions from relief to excitement to pleasure. Compared to that look, what is an hour of discomfort for me while wearing some earrings or a top that are so not my style?

Some consider this a cheap move. Some tell me I should start speaking my mind and admit aloud when I dont like a gift. I, however, am unable to do it. Even after years of knowing me if someone still picks up something I wouldnt like, I doubt my saying it aloud would change things. Thats my excuse. That and I think its terribly rude to say anything but ‘thank you’ when someone gifts you something. Its probably my convent upbringing. (its amazing how I can always make everything seem like the nuns’ fault!)

Thats my stand on the art of receiving gifts, unless its something that will cause permanent damage (like thongs!)

It started as a joke. 10 weeks of bachelorhood left. oooooooh!
He wondered whether he should be worried, whether there were going to be ‘limits’ set. And now I wonder “are there???”

Once you settle in to your late 20s (how I avoid talking about my real age!) you are pretty much setting your rules and living by them. It would be safe to assume so does your partner. If you wouldnt be like to be dictated to on what is allowed and what isnt, again safe to assume same goes for your partner. And yet I know of people doing exactly that.

I know of a couple that isnt allowed boys’ or girls’ night outs. I think it started with her being uncomfortable with his boys’ night outs and took it off the list. In return, he took her nights out with the girls off the list. Now, she willingly suffers through football game nights with his friends and he sits through dinners with her girlfriends. He secretly waits for her to tire of the game nights.

There is this friend who isnt allowed to get drunk without his presence. He, apparently, doesnt like it. Not that I recommend being drunk at every party but to fuss about not drinking at all at each party because someone else thinks you shouldnt doesnt make sense to me. If she turned around and told me she had reasons for her own for not drinking, I would understand. Similarly, if the boy in the earlier case had his own reason for not going out alone with the boys (like I cant spend an hour away from her, I love her!!) I would get it.

Its like this friend who isnt allowed to hang out with certain of his female friends. He hasnt given her any reason to doubt him. She realises too that it isnt a rational move but it hasnt stopped her from putting a cross against it. So he loses out on some good friends and she still struggles to explain the ban.

In every relationship, you adjust a little, compromise a little, give a little…….you do it FOR someone. When you start doing things BECAUSE of someone I worry that you may, one day, grudge that. Yes, it a partnership but at the end of the day, you are still an individual. How then can you impose your beliefs on to an other individual?

Of course all these thoughts may be a little premature……maybe I should mark this post, come back to a year from now and check whether they have changed You never know what a year of living with someone and being married can do.

I highlighted the word friends to ensure that my sarcastic tone got conveyed. (we need a font that conveys that effectively in case anybody’s listening) Back to the point though……bitching about people I know.

I like to believe that I am a pretty straight forward kind of person. It is rather difficult for me, then, to understand certain behaviour I see around me.

Case 1: A girl I went to college with

The only reason we spoke to each other was because we had a common friend who we were fond of  (or let me just speak for myself, I was fond of) Neither of us even pretended during those college years that we hung out with each other for any other reason. She knew I could barely tolerate her and I knew she didnt think much of me. We werent hostile to each other either. We were just there. Same place, same time, same crowd. Its been years since we graduated and we lost touch and it didnt effect our lives.

Now when you turn around and invite yourself to my wedding and tell me how you look forward to having a reunion with everyone including my sweet mother and are soooooooooooooooo happy for me and excited that I will get to experience the joys of marriage as you have been for years……uhmmm forgive me for being dense but all I can respond with is a “huh?” Did I miss the last few years where you were a part of my life in any way? Or lets go back all the way to college and ask if you cared that I existed or not. Now dont get me wrong. I am not grumpy about the fact that you didnt care then, thats the way it was with us. Some people are just never meant to care for each other. I dont get why suddenly you do. So yes I am still good friends with some people we both knew then and yes they will be there for my wedding but how does one react to you inviting yourself?

Honestly, I still dont have a response. Any ideas?

Case 2: A girl I knew in school; shared office space with later

So yes Ill admit we have known each other for years but I wonder if shared history automatically makes us ‘bff’ (that is what they are calling it these days, right?) I am sure you are a great person but we both know that though we hung out at work and work parties we never really hit it off…….unless of course I hit my head yesterday and am now suffering from amnesia. After the stunts and the games you pulled at work, I was pretty clear on distancing myself from you. And in case you hit your head yesterday and suffer from amnesia today, let me remind you of the absolutely childish things (I admit I am not proud of these, seriously the teenager in you never dies!) I did to ensure you got the message…… block you on my gtalk, take you off my facebook, etc. Then on my birthday when you text me using my nickname or ask friends in common about my “courtship” and call me to tell you “all that is happening” in a tone that suggests that we are indeed ‘bff’, I feel stumped.

And again, have no response.

Maybe its pms. Maybe I am being bitchy. Maybe I am just being silly. Maybe I am growing old.

“”Here’s a question, Pru. If you could use these pictures to tell a story, what would it be?”

It’s a hard question. I guess the story would be me, but I can tell she wants more, wants to know what the story would be that I’d tell about myself. And what is that story? I don’t know it yet. So I tell her, “It’s about the changes in me. You’ve been taking pictures of me since I was three. And now I’m ten. And someday I’ll be a teenager and then a grown-up with babies. That’s the story. Like the first pictures of me are almost when I’m still a baby, when I haven’t done anything exciting yet, or brave, when I don’t even know you that well, when I don’t even have a favorite kind of food. And then later, now, you can see those ways I’m more myself, more grown. And the cool thing is you’ll take just as many pictures this year and next year, and every time, the pictures will be one more piece of the puzzle.”

- The Effects of Light by Miranda Beverly-Whittemore

I picked up this book at The Strand Book Fair. Dont you love that feeling when a random book you picked up at some random place turns out to be a really good find?

I have been asked before how I pick up and buy the books I do. Difficult to explain but its just a vibe you get from the book you hold in your hand. You glance through its text, read the synopsis if any is offered and take a call. There have been times (rarely though) that I have been disappointed by my buys. This book was definitely not a disappointment.

I loved the way it put certain ideas and theories about art, society and culture to its readers. Most often I find it difficult to follow theories on art and culture….they just seem too pretentious to me. Of course, there is a very strong storyline to it but it has these theories and ideas that would make me read it again.

I know you are being supportive and kind. I dont need to be told about the patience you exert when dealing with me. I realise that you mean to be reassuring and yet…..

all it seems to do is emphasise the difference between us.

and I am left again back at square one.