Disclaimer: The year is 1984, when arranged marriages were not considered lame but a done thing! Finding love after marriage was the name of the game.
“Dong-dong, ding-dong …. the bells will chime in your heart”, I remember telling my brother-in-law, when he asked me, “When you find the one how do you know you are made for each other?”
“Is that what happened with you?” he asked me. This small innocuous question took me back to the time when I had first laid eyes on my wife-to-be, his sister.
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You Are The One For Me
You Are The One For Me this Backstreet Boys number can sum up your feeling when you know you have found the one for you.
When I saw her I know I had by then done the mandatory rounds of “seeing” the girls, found to be “appropriate” by my parents and nothing had done the trick. The interminable evenings were as boring as watching paint dry.
To hear my mother say it, you would feel that I had committed the biggest crime ever, rather than just saying “no” to a girl who did not make the Earth tilt for me or make me weak-kneed just by looking at her. I went through all the questions from the ladies too, but still I didn’t feel drawn to a single one.
Related Reading: How Long Does it Take to Fall In Love in an Arranged Marriage?
How does one explain to a parent the all-important aspect of liking a girl? You know – she’s the one – when the bells start ringing, when the world appears brighter, when you have a goofy smile plastered on your face, even while doing skull-numbing number crunching work in the office!
How to do you know you found the one? When you find the one, like in the movies you do feel the breeze playing with her hair. She looks at you and looks away as if showing that she knows the signs he’s the one! Gosh what a feeling.
The X-factor that I was looking for (trying to explain it is as difficult as nailing jelly to a tree) was just not there. What is this elusive “X” factor? I guess it’s different strokes for different folks.
When you find the one you see a future together
For me, on closing my eyes, if I could visualise both of us, sitting in compatible silence 30 years hence, occasionally holding hands and smiling at each other in complete understanding …. THAT was it! For me, she had to press all the right buttons for it to work.
And I was ready to wait a lifetime to find my soul mate, notwithstanding my parents’ pressure to marry. They, in their wisdom, thought that life was passing me by and soon no “eligible” girls would be left for me, as all the good ones would have been snapped up by more sensible “boys”.
Undeterred, I turned a blind eye to their cajoling looks every time I went home. People said you fall in love afterwards in an arranged marriage. But if the initial attraction and liking is not there, how can a person fall in love?
Life has a way of jolting you out of your stupor when you least expect it. Here I was cruising through life as happy as a dog with two tails, ignoring my parents’ beseeching looks when they asked me to “see” yet another girl as a favour to them.
They could not refuse the persons who had brought the proposal. …and so here we trooped again, en masse as a family for yet another “tea-and-poha” session and a hopeful look in my parents’ eyes.
They were hoping I would find the one finally but I was not sure at all. I was dreading putting another girl in a fix. Terrible!
Related Reading: 8 Arranged Marriage Facts That You Didn’t Know About
Signs she is the one
I still remember my faintly bored stance and the “oh-no-not-again” look on my face, receiving the first hard kick in my abdomen on seeing the “girl” for the first time, and I jack-knifed to sit up straight and look presentable.
An amused smile on my mother’s face told me that she had noted my reaction and was looking forward to the evening! Even before I looked at her a second time, I knew I have found the one.
Whoosh! went my heart, and suddenly, I found myself wanting to make the right “impression”. I started worrying if my hair was in place, if my shirt was crinkled or if I had forgotten to apply deo.
Sitting all by ourselves in a separate corner, I was enthralled by her talk (which my dazed senses didn’t register) and the hours just flew by.
Before I knew it, it was 9.30 at night and a gentle nudge from my mother made me aware that the family was waiting politely for both of us to join everyone, so that we could make an exit.
I never believed in love at first sight but did that just happen to me?
That magic X factor
What was it about her that had me so sure that she was THE one for me? Yes, she was (and still is) attractive, bright and intelligent, but it was her joie-de-vivre as opposed to my reticent nature, her bubbly self and vivaciousness, her charm and confidence that was not deterred by my imposing silences that had my heart beating faster than a greyhound in a race.
My reserved stodginess was offset by her effervescence, her light-hearted take on life was exactly what I was looking for! She even went ahead and complimented my smile. Wow!
To put it simply, she made me laugh. She wanted to fly and soar over the ordinary and I knew I would love to be the wind under her wings, both to help her spread her wings and also to keep her moored with me.
I knew she is the one
How to know she is one? This is a question many people ask me when they are in an arranged marriage setting. Well! I would say you know you have found the one when you immediately want to meet her a second time.
So enthralled was I by her, that I pestered my mother – quite unlike me – to give them an affirmative answer as soon as we could.
Related Reading: Aruna’s Views On Her Arranged Marriage And To Making It Work
When they dithered and wanted some more time, I made a beeline the very next day to their place, as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs, to assuage any doubts they had about my career, prospects and our life together.
Well, as we are still together after almost 35 years, suffice it to say that my charm and conviction worked on her and her family and today, my dream of spending the rest of my life with my soul mate in happy ramblings and relaxed evenings is as much a reality as sunrise.
And, by the way, the bells are still chiming!
How to know you have found the one? Dear brother-in-law have you got the right answer to your question now?
(As told to Vaishali Chandorkar-Chitale)
FAQs
If there is instant chemistry you know immediately you have found the one. You feel your heart starts beating faster, you feel totally drawn to them and you start thinking of a future together.
The soulmate connection is of a different kind. Not every relationship can turn into a soulmate relationship because it is of not the usual love connection. You know you have found your soulmate when there is a deep emotional connection and the love you feel for them is intense and sincere.
3 comments
What struck me the most in the article is “what it is going to be like in 30 years from now” . I mean, when it’s the right person, the future doesn’t scare you like a giant UFO circling over your head. You can see a life together. You feel like growing old together. And I guess, that’s the best part of it. When you know that “my story” and “your story” is now gonna be “our story “.
In this era of impatient rush and misunderstandings, reading something like this makes me feel like believing in love all over again. I am having a hard time putting into words all the emotions running inside my heart right now.
I got through many articles like this on internet, but this one is seriously one that you can put into practical. The point that how it will be after 30 years is seriously thought provoking. Now, I know that I have found her. This has really made me certain that yes I have found her. Feeling blessed to read this.