Renewing vows

I came to a sobering realisation recently. Quick calculations revealed that by the end of this week, I would have lived with the same man for thirty continuous years. Three decades of going through the ten thousand, nine hundred and fifty shades of life! Together! Now, isn’t that something? 

In fact, on paper it seems much more exciting than it actually is, this living- together-in- marital-bliss kind of balderdash. The term itself is an oxymoron, which means that it is a figure of speech that juxtaposes elements that appear to be contradictory, but contain a concealed point. And the point here is that there is no bliss in matrimony, for the first twenty odd years at least. There are a lot of other things: like laughing, fighting, sulking, appeasing, placating, bickering, joking, crying, arguing, exercising, eating, drinking, reading and so on. But is it all blissful and euphoric? Not by any stretch of the imagination. 

But let me tell all the diehard romantics not to lose heart because after the initial training years, which can stretch from fifteen to twenty, depending on each couple, things become easier. A whole lot easier let me add. And that is because by then we all age gracefully into a state of semi deafness and semi blindness and with this natural decline, we don’t see or hear each other’s faults as clearly as we once did. The result is that we no longer have the compulsive urge to point them out. So if there are no mistakes, there is nothing to correct, and therefore, there is less friction. 

It is precisely at stage that long married couples start resembling each other. Believe me, it’s true. If two people who are living together are amicable all the time — eat the same food, watch the same television serials, listen to the same music, laugh at the same Pammi Aunty jokes — it is but natural that they think alike and begin to look alike too. 

I used to get very perturbed when people in the Gulf countries asked me if my husband and I had a “cousin marriage”. In our culture, marrying your cousin is considered a sacrilege, completely and indisputably. I would get horrified but after replying in the negative I tried to look for physical similarities between my spouse and me. There were none. Outwardly, we were as different as chalk and cheese. 

But of late I started noticing what the strangers must have detected earlier on, that is, our mannerisms have become, sort of, identical. My husband scrunches up his eyes the same way as I do when I don’t understand something. His bout of coughing always culminates in a giant sneeze, like, well, mine. He puts a hand in front of his mouth whenever he is about to utter a white lie, like I do, and he compliments the chef, if he has cooked a good meal, in the exact same fashion, as me. 

“Some people renew their vows on their silver wedding anniversary,” I informed my husband. 

“That is the twenty fifth year,” my spouse stated. 

“We forgot,” I complained. 

“Seven rounds of the holy fire in the Vedic tradition? ” he questioned. 

“Seven rounds of the holy fire,” I repeated. 

“That can be easily remedied,” he said 

“How?” I asked, checking if his hand was in front of his mouth. 

“By making fourteen rounds of the holy fire,” he deadpanned. 

“Seven clockwise and the rest anticlockwise,” I agreed.