Love, Marriage and Other Modern-Day Disasters

Edited to add the bit at the end, paraphrased from my comment to Passionate Goof's post.

Last week, I saw a movie and a reality show finale that had me questioning my views on love. I thought I’d share them here and wonder aloud, and request you all to do me the honour of sharing your thoughts as well.

Ok. First, the movie. No prizes for guessing that it’s “Love Aaj Kal” that I’m talking about. I didn’t like it. There. I said it. I didn’t like it.

I won’t diss it totally; there are some things I liked about it, but only in hindsight. Like the fact that Deepika’s character, Meera, was shown to be a career-woman and that she was ambitious. And not in an evil, greedy, money-hungry way that most movies will depict career-minded women, to be. She was at a good place in her life, career-wise, and she chose that over a relationship that very possibly would have fizzled out after six months. She chose a certainty over what seemed to be a non-certainty at the time. And she wasn’t vilified for it. If anything, her choice seemed the most natural thing in the world. You know what the weird thing about this is? It’s the fact that so many blogs have talked about this very fact and hailed it to be a great step forward in the depiction of ‘real women, making real choices’ in a reel land, and yet it escaped me. That’s because her action never ever really struck me as being note-worthy or out of the ordinary. If anything, it was so natural, so RIGHT, that it didn’t make me sit and take notice. I glossed over how ground-breaking it might be. It was only later that I realised that “Wow, this is a slice of reality. Something that we are not only comfortable with, but also, something that we know to be regular and not at all extraordinary.”

It’s this practicality that’s kinda killing me though. Do love and reason go hand-in-hand? Is love supposed to be a well-thought out, logical reaction to a certain situation that presents itself before us? And if it is; if we start being logical about love from the very get-go, what prevents us from being logical right through the end? If so, then why didn’t Meera stick with the safe, secure, good-looking and madly-in-love-with-her, Rahul Khanna-character? Is it fair to ruin somebody else’s life so that you can wait for someone else to come to his senses and realise that he’s in love with you after all? Umm, what if that don’t happen, mamma? Wotchya gonna do then?

I know, I know…her arguments in defence of her actions made sense, but girl! Suck it up!! You could have done a lot worse!

I know a lot of people who agree with me. And yet, there are many who laud a Meera’s actions. They say, isn’t it better to get out once you know you don’t love a person, rather than drag on a relationship and be miserable? Ok, but what about the hurt and pain that you’re causing the other? Do you have the right to do that?

I don’t know. It all seems so confusing. I personally know of a few people who broke off engagements and relationships because they fell in love with other people or were in love with their ex-es. One of these worthies broke off his wedding twenty days before D-Day, months after all the invitation cards had been sent out and all the preparations had been made!! I mean, who does that?!?

Why am I so riled about this? Well, a little incident from my past. One of the MIM’s ex-girlfriends flew all the way from Delhi to Bombay, to convince him to change his mind, dump me and marry her! It didn’t happen (obviously!!), but what if she had managed to convince him? What would I have done? Drowned my sorrows, had indiscriminate sex with random guys, come out stronger six months later singing “I Will Survive”? Or would I have been broken, dejected and sworn-off men forever? Or would I have married the first guy who would have answered my matrimonial ad on Shaadi.com?

I left the theatre after watching ‘Love Aaj Kal’ feeling very irritated. Is this what our generation has become? Selfish to the point that we don’t care whose feelings we are trampling as long as we get what we want? Also, has marriage really become as easy as a fake orgasm…switch on and off as and when needed? Get on and off the train whenever and wherever you want…there are no scheduled stops anymore?

And our parent’s generation. Was it all so simple and pure for them? You fall in love just once and that too forever? How strategic to use Rishi and Neetu Singh as Veer and Harleen Singh, btw!! The symbol of romance and marriage gone right, direct from Bollywood !

And then of course, there’s another take on ‘love-shove’ and all that, by the tremendously loud and garish Ms. Rakhi Sawant. Say what you want about the woman, but what she did was pretty path-breaking. Centuries after this age-old, ancient Indian custom had come to a halt, Ms. Sawant chooses to revive it, and on television no less! While we all laughed, had fun, commented on the bad acting and said whatever we wanted about it being scripted and all, it doesn’t take away from the fact that what Rakhi did, was very empowering to many, many women, subjected to the torture of ‘being seen’ by guys and their families before marriage and then rejected, for not being fair enough, pretty enough, too educated, too fat, too skinny and what-not. Rakhi’s ultimate choice was a logical, practical one…the best kind to make when love ain’t sniffing at your door.

Which brings me back to my dilemma? Is love practical in today's day and age? I mean, here's what I think...I feel that the 'live on love and fresh air' variety is not only a rarity in today's world, isn't it too good to be true? Doesn't it even sound impractical? But that's not it. It's this -- marriage springs you many a googly. Painful and unexpected -- enough to shatter your heart. So I can't help but wonder, if many of us had weighed our love on a scale of practicality, would we have gone on and married our spouse nevertheless?