So what do you do when you have a thesis to write and less than a month to submit it?
You eat, drink, you finish the book you've been reading, write a verse or two, knead some bread (and bake it), watch a movie and then write a longass blog post about it.
Really I am pathetic.
So as you may be aware (if not check out my pre wedding posts on the blog which I am not too keen on sharing here), the Lady got married recently. As she is going about settling into this conjugal bliss/confusion/blissful confusion (?), it's time for us, both of us, to kill ourselves over yet another endeavor again.
And WHAT is this endeavor pray? Why, it is the final project of our MBA program - the Grand Thesis!
Comprising of a grand 15,000 odd words and a million other mundane things to do, to complete this monstrous task we were given, realistically, a little over one measly month. Technically the time period should be 3 months but well, by the time the method of the project had been conveyed to us, a whole two months are gone. Poof! Just like that!
Well technically, we could have started a month or so back but you know how things are in Procrastination Land. With hubby boy setting me to shame with procrastination skills, I am a little way ahead of him really in this whole arduous process.
And why am I writing this post now? Because PROCRASTINATION.
But I have my reasons you see. Just days after the wedding ceremony, we had to submit an assignment, over which we slaved over during what should have technically been our honeymoon. And no sooner do we hand THIS over, we are dragged away on yet another exciting adventure - talk about great timing for marriage.
And we are planning on a proper honeymoon as soon as all this hullabaloo is over. Heck, we are planning on honeymooning every other week!
Anyways,
Life is a little bit complicated now, what with shifting of residences, learning the life in two instead of one (two is better than one they say which I sometimes, only sometimes, begin to doubt), adjusting, adjusting and then adjusting some more. There's just too much of adjusting going on.
Am I such a horrible person that I sometimes keep pining for the days pre-marriage?
Marriage is a tremendous thing. I say tremendous because I can't find any other suitable word for it. There's the entire and complete change of lifestyle that is more than a little hard to swallow (btw, I think it is brutal that it is the girl who has to give up her name, the home where she grew up in, her family, move into an entirely strange place and set up life anew burdened with a ton of responsibilities that she had never known.) No matter what anybody says, it is the woman who makes the biggest sacrifices in a marriage. Let no one else tell you otherwise.
The other thing is the list of expectations that come with being married. Here in Sri Lanka you don't just marry the man, you marry his entire family, his grand uncle's first cousin, his daughter and her pet dog. Your man you can handle (sometimes), even the man's parents (here I have no complaints because I am blessed with the sweetest in-laws ever and I find myself adoring them even more than the hubby person :P ), but the extended family and friends - that I was not prepared for. You are expected to visit the relations' houses, the numerous alms givings, funerals, birthdays, Avrudu visits, bana, etc and being the new kid on the block, you are not supposed to miss a single one! And to just sit there smiling all prim and proper making conversation although you have absolutely nothing in common- let's just say that it's only slightly tolerable than having my fingernails pulled out.
What you can't really shake off is this great loss of independence. You going anywhere alone is suddenly frowned upon, you are always expected to be seen in twos (you went to your own home by yourself?? Where's your husband/wife? You came by yourself??Oh horror!). There's also this sense of lost identity as you are identified as not you, Jayani C. Senanayake, woman, individual, human being in her own right but as somebody's wife/somebody's new daughter-in-law, etc. And it all feels very strange.
It's also strange, but you really can't help but feel that you are only half of what you really are, half of what you should be. It's sometimes like you are on this vacation that you don't particularly enjoy (or not enjoy) and your actual life is elsewhere, waiting for you. It's otherworldly sometimes, like being in an alien ship, being abducted. Or some equally unnerving thing.
Oh before I forgot, Melisandre gave life to Jon Snow! Useless bugger he is. He's been refusing every damn exciting thing that he has been suggested so far except to go to the North to fight Ramsey. Finally. I was beginning to wonder what a waste of resources to bring him back to life.
Getting back to the topic,
Leave alone mental trauma, the utter exhaustion (I'm used to working 20 hours a day and I'm more exhausted by all THIS than 20 hours of nonstop work) and etc, but I think the biggest challenge for me is that being a loner, sharing my space and maintaining my boundaries. For example, I like to sleep in late and wake up to a cool, dark room on my own terms whereas the hubby boy throws open the windows the moment he wakes (and he wakes way earlier than me), flooding the room with sunlight. This annoys me. Like REALLY annoys me.
On one hand you thank your lucky stars to have found someone as amazing as him. On the other, you end up wondering WHY you decided to get married in the first place - I tell you, it's a constant dilemma.
Don't get me wrong, I married my best friend and partner in crime of so many years and we love each other to bits and pieces. But we are not perfect. We've gone through hell and back holding hands, we bicker and fight but at the end of the day we always end up in each other's arms. Having been together for 7 odd years, you naturally assume that you know everything there is to know about each other and take comfort in the fact that you two are so much alike. But once you start living with each other and start building a life together only you realize how different you really are, how contradictory your needs and priorities are. (actually I think the differences start playing out when you start planning your wedding together).
So how do you reconcile those differences?
You don't. You just need to remind yourself that you are two completely different human beings from two completely different backgrounds and always remind yourself how much you love and respect one another. As time goes on and as you distance yourself from the "Me" concept and start viewing the world through the "We" lens, you learn to be kind. You learn to be patient. You always remind yourself that the other person is trying too. Ultimately, things get easier. However, the practicalities remain. You do change. Tremendously. Monolithically. Stupendously.
And you learn to love more, to give more. And to expect nothing in return. You learn to look after yourself and in the process, you grow stronger.It's a good feeling, a satisfying feeling.
Alone, in a stranger's house, learning to fend for yourself, away from people who surrounded you with nothing but love all your life, you learn what being a woman is all about.
In certain ways you are happy - happy to come home into loving arms and adoring eyes, happy to wake up to tight hugs (when you are not waking up to shrill alarms that is). In certain ways, life has become strange, stranger than fiction and it is too far out of your comfort zone to be really happy with.
Oh and also RR Martin has released the first chapter of Winds of Winter. The dirty bastard. There's no end to him taunting us. It pisses me off.
Anyways,
I thought I should make a small list of things that changed after marriage, you know, just to keep score. I'd like to check back a month from now and keep monitoring. It should be interesting. So here goes.
You eat, drink, you finish the book you've been reading, write a verse or two, knead some bread (and bake it), watch a movie and then write a longass blog post about it.
Really I am pathetic.
So as you may be aware (if not check out my pre wedding posts on the blog which I am not too keen on sharing here), the Lady got married recently. As she is going about settling into this conjugal bliss/confusion/blissful confusion (?), it's time for us, both of us, to kill ourselves over yet another endeavor again.
And WHAT is this endeavor pray? Why, it is the final project of our MBA program - the Grand Thesis!
Comprising of a grand 15,000 odd words and a million other mundane things to do, to complete this monstrous task we were given, realistically, a little over one measly month. Technically the time period should be 3 months but well, by the time the method of the project had been conveyed to us, a whole two months are gone. Poof! Just like that!
Well technically, we could have started a month or so back but you know how things are in Procrastination Land. With hubby boy setting me to shame with procrastination skills, I am a little way ahead of him really in this whole arduous process.
And why am I writing this post now? Because PROCRASTINATION.
But I have my reasons you see. Just days after the wedding ceremony, we had to submit an assignment, over which we slaved over during what should have technically been our honeymoon. And no sooner do we hand THIS over, we are dragged away on yet another exciting adventure - talk about great timing for marriage.
And we are planning on a proper honeymoon as soon as all this hullabaloo is over. Heck, we are planning on honeymooning every other week!
Anyways,
Life is a little bit complicated now, what with shifting of residences, learning the life in two instead of one (two is better than one they say which I sometimes, only sometimes, begin to doubt), adjusting, adjusting and then adjusting some more. There's just too much of adjusting going on.
Am I such a horrible person that I sometimes keep pining for the days pre-marriage?
Marriage is a tremendous thing. I say tremendous because I can't find any other suitable word for it. There's the entire and complete change of lifestyle that is more than a little hard to swallow (btw, I think it is brutal that it is the girl who has to give up her name, the home where she grew up in, her family, move into an entirely strange place and set up life anew burdened with a ton of responsibilities that she had never known.) No matter what anybody says, it is the woman who makes the biggest sacrifices in a marriage. Let no one else tell you otherwise.
The other thing is the list of expectations that come with being married. Here in Sri Lanka you don't just marry the man, you marry his entire family, his grand uncle's first cousin, his daughter and her pet dog. Your man you can handle (sometimes), even the man's parents (here I have no complaints because I am blessed with the sweetest in-laws ever and I find myself adoring them even more than the hubby person :P ), but the extended family and friends - that I was not prepared for. You are expected to visit the relations' houses, the numerous alms givings, funerals, birthdays, Avrudu visits, bana, etc and being the new kid on the block, you are not supposed to miss a single one! And to just sit there smiling all prim and proper making conversation although you have absolutely nothing in common- let's just say that it's only slightly tolerable than having my fingernails pulled out.
  |
| Let's visit all our relatives just once, he said |
What you can't really shake off is this great loss of independence. You going anywhere alone is suddenly frowned upon, you are always expected to be seen in twos (you went to your own home by yourself?? Where's your husband/wife? You came by yourself??Oh horror!). There's also this sense of lost identity as you are identified as not you, Jayani C. Senanayake, woman, individual, human being in her own right but as somebody's wife/somebody's new daughter-in-law, etc. And it all feels very strange.
It's also strange, but you really can't help but feel that you are only half of what you really are, half of what you should be. It's sometimes like you are on this vacation that you don't particularly enjoy (or not enjoy) and your actual life is elsewhere, waiting for you. It's otherworldly sometimes, like being in an alien ship, being abducted. Or some equally unnerving thing.
Oh before I forgot, Melisandre gave life to Jon Snow! Useless bugger he is. He's been refusing every damn exciting thing that he has been suggested so far except to go to the North to fight Ramsey. Finally. I was beginning to wonder what a waste of resources to bring him back to life.
Getting back to the topic,
Leave alone mental trauma, the utter exhaustion (I'm used to working 20 hours a day and I'm more exhausted by all THIS than 20 hours of nonstop work) and etc, but I think the biggest challenge for me is that being a loner, sharing my space and maintaining my boundaries. For example, I like to sleep in late and wake up to a cool, dark room on my own terms whereas the hubby boy throws open the windows the moment he wakes (and he wakes way earlier than me), flooding the room with sunlight. This annoys me. Like REALLY annoys me.
On one hand you thank your lucky stars to have found someone as amazing as him. On the other, you end up wondering WHY you decided to get married in the first place - I tell you, it's a constant dilemma.
Don't get me wrong, I married my best friend and partner in crime of so many years and we love each other to bits and pieces. But we are not perfect. We've gone through hell and back holding hands, we bicker and fight but at the end of the day we always end up in each other's arms. Having been together for 7 odd years, you naturally assume that you know everything there is to know about each other and take comfort in the fact that you two are so much alike. But once you start living with each other and start building a life together only you realize how different you really are, how contradictory your needs and priorities are. (actually I think the differences start playing out when you start planning your wedding together).
So how do you reconcile those differences?
You don't. You just need to remind yourself that you are two completely different human beings from two completely different backgrounds and always remind yourself how much you love and respect one another. As time goes on and as you distance yourself from the "Me" concept and start viewing the world through the "We" lens, you learn to be kind. You learn to be patient. You always remind yourself that the other person is trying too. Ultimately, things get easier. However, the practicalities remain. You do change. Tremendously. Monolithically. Stupendously.
And you learn to love more, to give more. And to expect nothing in return. You learn to look after yourself and in the process, you grow stronger.It's a good feeling, a satisfying feeling.
Alone, in a stranger's house, learning to fend for yourself, away from people who surrounded you with nothing but love all your life, you learn what being a woman is all about.
In certain ways you are happy - happy to come home into loving arms and adoring eyes, happy to wake up to tight hugs (when you are not waking up to shrill alarms that is). In certain ways, life has become strange, stranger than fiction and it is too far out of your comfort zone to be really happy with.
Oh and also RR Martin has released the first chapter of Winds of Winter. The dirty bastard. There's no end to him taunting us. It pisses me off.
Anyways,
I thought I should make a small list of things that changed after marriage, you know, just to keep score. I'd like to check back a month from now and keep monitoring. It should be interesting. So here goes.
- Goodbye lovely long nails. Hello scraggly bits that faintly resemble human nails.
- I can skin and debone a chicken under 5 minutes.
- I watch the occasional non-horror/non-psycho thriller movie and do not complain about it. (Wait, what?!?)
- I get up much earlier than usual (those who know me would know that in my world, getting up at all, let alone getting up early, equals death)
- I don't really care what I look like. Hair looking like something just exploded in there and you are in butt shorts, all dusty and hot, having been cleaning the ceiling fans but have to run to town to get 5 eggs? No problem.
- I am no longer choosy about what I eat. Sprats, spinach, potatoes, fish - I eat it all, not even a whimper.
- I put up with damp bathrooms full of muddy footsteps. Just a month back, I would have called the fire brigade to hose the place down but now, I just go meh.
- I go without my morning cup of tea (HUH? :O). After getting up at 5 and preparing office lunches, I literally have no time for tea. Days when I just could NOT wake up without my tea seem a lifetime away.
- I can cut and deseed a watermelon, conjure up business plans in my head, button my shirt and screw on my earrings at the same time. Multitasking - Nailed it!
More of this - laters.
So is marriage really for me? I would love to shout out a big, loud, cheerful yes, but a bit of the same old usual reluctant me remains inside looking slightly doubtful. The truth is I don't know, not just yet. It sure isn't easy and it isn't always a bed of roses. But we do get by. Baby steps. One day at a time.
So is marriage really for me? I would love to shout out a big, loud, cheerful yes, but a bit of the same old usual reluctant me remains inside looking slightly doubtful. The truth is I don't know, not just yet. It sure isn't easy and it isn't always a bed of roses. But we do get by. Baby steps. One day at a time.
So these days I drift through life with the gait of a dreamwalker (which is literally the case because I am up till the wee hours of the morning working on my thesis and in the morning I have to go to work with less than 3 hours of sleep where I sleepwalk through the day all over again. I have no leave. I got married.). The light at the end of the tunnel seems so very far off and frankly, I'm not even sure if there is at least a flashlight at the end of it.
I long for the day that we can wake up properly and start living once again. This thesis is draining the life out of all of us. But the good thing is, we've got each other's back :)
2 comments:
Congrats on getting married! Ah I know all those changes with marriage, but I have learned that in order to be a good friend/wife/daughter/etc... to others I have to "fill myself" first. So I scheduled a '30 min me time daily'.
I also went without tea when I got married and now got back into my normal routine. You have to do things to make yourself happy too, remember that. Anyway it's your journey so good luck ! and good luck with the thesis!
Journey yes, and a bumpy one :( It's good to hear that it gets better and thank you for the comforting words. "Me time" well, it seems somewhat strange having to assign "Me time" when it used to be "Me time" all the time just two months ago! And what with a thesis in tow needless to say things aren't very easy right now. And thank you! Your wishes mean much :)
Post a Comment