Love,Pain,Joy, Obstacles

He had promised her mother, “ I will surely marry her. This time you give the marriage date. I am ready to marry any time. I will be your son-in-law.’’

After a long time she met him, and dined in a restuarant. It was a beautiful evening. He had pleaded to her that he would marry and she must forget and forgive earlier bitter events. It had been very difficult for her, and very taxing on her nerves also.

She had very hardly and courageously pulled her up and met him after a long time. 

He had recently recovered from fatty liver and he loved chicken. She tried to introduce him to chicken preparations that were not fried and spicy yet delicious and hygienically prepared.

They bonded over Chicken Straugennoff, Chicken Sizzler. She had taken a glass of plain Blue Lagoon Mocktail which aroused his curiosity and was a hot topic of discussion. She was a teetotaler, but enjoyed that Blue Lagoon was a very special drink available in the bar, always featuring in the Special Menu and that too in non-alcoholic plain form. The evening was beautiful and very healing. 

She had suffered from a lot of stress and this evening was a cool balm like the evening breeze.

So he had asked ,“When will we get married?’’

She had laughed and proposed a very auspicious date. 

He was in very good mood. “Yes, why not! But what will we do in the next few months in between?’’

She had replied, “Don’t worry. The next few months will fly away.’’

Well, she had seen his reaction. It was favorable-no objection at all. She was happy. When she rode back in her car, the car seemed to be flying.

Then again she had taken him to a beautiful book café owned by a rich owner of Darjeeling tea gardens. He had liked the ambience, and the Chicken Thukpa that they had shared. He was developing a love for Continental dishes that were not fried and spicy, healthy yet tasty much to her relief. She cared for him a lot and never gave him anything that was bad for him. They were sitting in a cosy corner. He had said, “Why don’t we drive everybody out? Just imagine, in this whole place, only you and me.’’

The girl had started healing. One of her well –wishers had said, “Do not worry. Nothing bad would happen to you.’’ This well wisher was a beautiful-hearted man. He was one outsider whom she genuinely liked. Outwardly he was tough, but inwardly he was very compassionate with a beautiful heart. The combination of manliness and depth of genuine compassion in his voice; the melting of the toughness and the emergence of manly softness and gentleness unexpectedly and beautifully got reflected in his facial expressions in her encounters with him. This was enough to make her love his heart. He had become a strong pillar of support in her healing.

This time she felt the marriage date would certainly work out. Is there anything wrong if a girl puts her faith in a God and prefers the day of His worship hoping that the Lord, being the remover of all obstacles and negativities, would bless her marriage? She had met her husband in front of her painting of this God. She respected the Lord a lot for making her meet her life partner. 

 She had planned that in the middle of the month, after her husband’s birthday, she would tell the date. She had been rehearsing and re-rehearsing in her mind with a lot of pleasure. She was a bit apprehensive after some bitter experiences, but still she had dreams. One should never stop positively dreaming under any circumstance.

There was a Shivalinga near her house. It was the month of Sravana. She had always prayed from her heart and was never into too much of idol worship. But this year she felt a strange divine affection for the Shivalinga. She was a person who needed to be lonely to pray to God. The little place of worship was never very crowded and noisy and she could be alone in front of the Shivalinga and worship enjoying privacy. Her life was a cocktail of uncertainty and problems which even with the best of intentions she was unable to manage at times. She was bewildered. She decided to visit the Shivalinga everyday and worship to get some solace.

Unexpected problems and conflicts leading to unwanted stress cropped up. In spite of complications, she dreamt that the problems and conflicts will get resolved. Little by little the problems also started getting less severe. She could not say what would have happened if she had not visited the Shivalinga, but somewhere she felt that the Shivalinga worship was helping. 

She devotionally bathed the Shivalinga in water, raw milk with saffron. She offered flowers like Dhutra, Jui ,Bel,Akondo, Nagkeshar. The garland of Juiphool she got one day was very special. It beautifully embraced the Shivalinga. 

She always asked God to forgive her sins she had done in her previous births. She wanted to marry, that too a properly conducted marriage with proper family and pregnancy planning so much. But always there was a problem beyond her comprehension-uncertainty, unfortunate circumstances, financial problems, confusing behavior and strange whims of her partner sometimes beyond her comprehension,causing a lot of mental discomfort. She often saw couples who had happily married or had earlier married part ways, or stuck in an unhappy suffocating relationship.

She prayed to God to bless all married couples with marital bliss and bless unmarried persons also. She never envied happily married couples. She always prayed for their good, even for her male well-wisher whom she would have readily married if he was single. She never harmed anybody or wished evil of others. She always helped and was very compassionate. But in spite of this she was not getting the best out of life. She gave good things to people, but except her mother nobody gave her good things in return, especially a good environment.  

The type of people she had seen were not her type-she wanted to see and work with people operating sensibly in moderation with sensible choices, habits and good sense of self-control and common sense. In the dense dark forest of humans it was rare to find. She felt much better if they were at a distance. 

But with husband you cannot maintain distance. The vast difference of habits, upbringing and tastes between her and her partner was a troubling factor. Many of his habits and tastes were not good. He was not good in deciding. Often what he said, the versions varied. He had admitted that his hands and feet had become bigger in size but he was still a baby and needed a guardian. Sometimes he was loving and understanding, sometimes too much taxing and pressurising and horrible-she felt she would never see hid face again, some whims and comments were too difficult to digest, sometimes there would be the greatest of conflicts, sometimes she would start doubting how he actually was………………but then again a feeling would come back uniting them.

She thanked God for whatever she had got……………….she always had gratitude even in difficult circumstances. On difficult days there was always something good she had got, or done…………….she was creative and had many ideas in her mind which often people understood, often did not, often it was difficult to give shape to an idea…………..but creativity had made many days beautiful………………and she was thankful to God for gifting her with sensible decision making ability, ability of self-care, self-control and a sense of limit for which may be other people at times despised her but she could avoid many troubles and diseases. Many people said she was different and despised her good qualities and some exceptional abilities, but she knew God loved her. God had created her like that. 

God always has some purpose and intentions when He creates. People often disrespect or depreciate God’s multiple variety of creations because of the limitations of their thinking and the dirty lens of their eyes. But they are never above God. People disrespect themselves-that is why they engage in self-disrespectful and self-insulting addictive, torturous ,mindless and obsessive activities and talks………….they try to run away from themselves instead of facing themselves………they are not at peace with themselves. How can they respect others and let them be at peace? Many try to match others and lose or forget their senses. Who are they to judge others? And why should one see oneself through them?

Everybody is different. If you are different, God wants you to do special things differently than others. You should rejoice, and love yourself, and that she did, despite life’s complications. If there are obstacles, one should have patience and faith in God –God will help overcome the obstacles in the right time. And the obstacles are also there for a reason which God knows.