She had put an ad for selling a product on social media. She had spread the word with her friends and acquaintances for the same. However, after months and months of effort, she was not getting any positive response. One fine day, while scrolling down her WhatsApp messages, she was thrilled to find a message related to a response to her advertisement. It was a pop-up message from one of the buyers who seemed to be interested in her product.
Basically, the product that she was selling was full-size mirrors around 6ft*3 ft dimensions which were ideal for gyms, activity centers, dance academies, playschools, or any creative or sports activity center. Though the mirrors were purchased in a lot of amounts, she was selling them at nearly 50 percent less than the rate. So while she was chatting with the buyer and negotiating a fair deal, suddenly the buyer on the other side of the message asked her “ Are you Single?”. She felt quite weird as she was talking very professionally and she dint like a personal question. Anyways to be nice enough to answer the question she replied “No”. The buyer dint stop at that he further asked her if she was interested in making friends with her. She made it clear to him that she dint like the way the conversation was shaping up and all she wanted was to sell her product and wanted to stick to that…..but on continuous coaxing and forcing for friendship unfortunately she had to block him and withdraw the conversation.
And this is not the first time it has happened to her, Anita is 44 years old and she is still single. Wherever she goes whether in a social gathering, with friends getting together, at society meetings, or with relatives she is being looked down upon by the other people of her age who are all mostly married and have kids either in their teens or early twenties. They all are busy with their spouses and families and while Anita too has a family comprising of her mother, brother, and sister, as per law and society they are not considered as family. Society often ridicules unmarried people and is very adept at handing them character certificates. Married people with kids can have multiple affairs outside marriage, but as they are putting up a good show in front of the society of being a happy united family no one tells them anything.
These things somehow irritated Anita a lot. Its not that Anita and her family never made any efforts for her marriage . They had advertised in mostly all the digital social media channels and newspapers. The family had conversations and meetings with the prospective matches but somewhere or the other could not find a suitable match for her. Sometimes due to some astrology reason, education or family background, or the general looks of the people. Also, Anita had some very bad experiences with the marriages of her own sisters whose respective spouses had nearly destroyed their families. As she lost her father at a very young age her mother could not handle the crooked and wicked son in laws and they took advantage of the situation.
Anita fell in love 4 to 5 times and wanted to settle down with the guys but they were not up to her mark as in betrayed her trust, broke her heart, and were also not approved by the families. The adverse effects of marriage and relationships had damaged her psychologically. Marriage to her was a cage in which one has to give up on one’s individuality and adjust to another person and family because it's believed that in old age the spouse and kids are going to take care of the person. While in many cases, spouses are either separated or are no more living and the kids are busy in their own lives and are interested only in the property. It’s a kind of jail and there is no partnership or friendship but more of a proprietorship with no personal life or happiness left to an individual. So the advantages of marriage dint hold much importance for Anita and she just gave up the idea.
In our country when one is of a particular age people automatically start putting the title as Mrs, be in on any hospital form, ticket reservation, any kind of survey, any id form on assumption. People of 20-25 years start addressing them as “ Aunty”. The marital status of a person is very important here. One feels very successful and proud and it is a kind of trophy to have a spouse and kids hanging by their side even if there is no love, no respect, or no genuine feelings.
Anita doesn’t feel incomplete creation of God, she feels that God has made her absolutely complete. A spouse, boyfriend, or lover are just assets to some field of her life but they nowhere make her complete. A partner is one that makes one feel more stronger and independent. She has to learn to ignore the negatives, have full faith in herself and follow all her dreams, and not be affected by any of the social taboo questions like are you married or “Are you Single?”