My husband, Vishal, and I are what you would call childhood sweethearts. We’ve been together fifteen and a half years, and married for one year today. You’d think getting married after 14 1/2 years together would mean no surprises and a simple change in title.
But that isn’t what it is.
What it is, instead, is an amazing journey that surprises you at every turn and still manages to be familiar enough to be comforting and comfortable. And it will tell you something that you may already know but not have realized, or just make you learn, certain things about marriage, relationships, men and women. These are a few things I learned in the past one year:
- Taking care of your husband, or your wife, isn’t a responsibility – it’s a pleasure. You have someone who will turn to you for the simplest, and most complicated of things, and you want to take care of those things. All you care about getting in return is that smile that says more than words can ever do.
- Men are truly like children – sometimes, if not always – and that is one of the best qualities they have. It is what gives us that much-needed breath of impulsiveness and excitement in a life that is otherwise so very adult.
- Marry someone who can make you smile and laugh. When life leaves you physically, emotionally and mentally deflated, the only thing that matters is the one who can make you smile with his/her presence, and make you laugh with jokes on situations cracked at a time that many would consider too premature. Nothing diffuses tension and anger like a premature joke that is balancing on the thin border of ‘this is funny as hell’ and ‘too early to be even remotely funny’.
- Fighting isn’t always bad. Yeah, it leaves a bad taste in your mouth and takes some time to be forgotten. But it reminds you of the things that you forget in your daily take-for-granted life; it reminds you of what is really important, it reminds you of who you really are, what you’re capable of and most importantly, why your marriage and relationship is worth fighting for.
- Sometimes you need someone you love to tell you that there’s something wrong, that something has changed. Because they won’t just tell you and disappear. They’ll help you rectify it, even if it means facing hell during the process. It’s tough, but it’s made easy when the person who understands you the most and knows how difficult the process can be for you, helps you overcome your demons.
- You don’t love someone in spite of their flaws, you love them for their faults. It’s what makes them whole, makes them human and gives them the strength they have to be the best they are.
- Life is going to get in the way. Responsibilities, work, health issues – they’re all going to get in the way of the romantic marriage you may have built up in your head. So learn to identify the moments that matter. And make the most mundane of moments matter – those are the ones you’ll remember forever.
- Romance isn’t about chocolates and flowers. Romance is about choosing to make the coffee so that your partner gets that extra five minutes of sleep he/she so desperately wants. Romance is about stopping in the middle of a busy, errand-filled day to hug your wife/husband. Romance is about realizing that every moment can be a real experience if you just remember that you’re spending it with the one you love.
And that brings me to this point, where I tell my husband, the man who is the biggest critic to my creativeness, my best friend and the absolute love of my life, some part of what I really feel.
Vishal, this is for you.
There is no one quite like you, no one who can make me laugh as you do, make me smile as you do and make me feel alive as you do. Coming home to you every evening is the highlight of my day and a moment I look forward to even today, after so many years together. We are definitely not alike, regardless of what others think, and that’s what makes us so complete. I can’t imagine a life without you. Your crazy matches my crazy. And I know that we will be crazy together, forever. Because you’re stuck with me. And that’s just something you’re going to have to live with….
As though you’d want it any other way! 😛
Happy Anniversary, my love.
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