By S. Nivedya:
Oil and vinegar! They may not mix but they make a great combination on a sandwich.
What is a perfect match? Like the fit of a lock and key? Or the pieces of a puzzle? And what is it that makes a perfect match? Sweet music in the background, the eyes speaking and of course flowers, butterflies and slow motion! How beautiful! How wonderful!
The bride Maria, radiant in all her beauty walks along the aisle in her grand wedding gown, handpicked by experts keeping in mind every detail to accentuate her beauty. Her make up simply perfect, her flawless smile melting the onlooking audience. She is guided by her father and given away to Joe, the handsome groom, clad in a crisp tuxedo with a flower tucked in his chest pocket. He flashes his million dollar grin, leads the bride up the step where their vows are exchanged and the happily married couple ride away into the sunset to live happily ever after. The spectators watch with tears in their eyes and we sink into our couches and say: Isn’t that beautiful. That’s so perfect!
Well! Sorry to pop your bubble. That kind of perfect happens only in the movies. So if you ever get that sing-song tra-la-la-la butterfly-ish moment, you can be sure that would be followed by an ear-piercing bell or a painful pinch. That’s right! You’re dreaming my friend. Snap out of it! Open your eyes and say hello to reality!
That kind of scene I spoke about earlier cannot possibly happen here. Our reality Maria could have a wide gap between her teeth and Joe could be, well, sloppy Joe!
There is a man I saw. Everything about him seemed really positive. He was smart, he was an awesome communicator and he had a lot of credits to add to his name. I couldn’t help but fantasize what his perfect match would look like.
Two days later I saw a woman lunching with him…she had a big nose, horrible skin and irritatingly tangled hair. I was dejected to learn from a friend that, that woman was his wife. “Oh my god! I wonder what he saw in her, she is a terrible match for a man like that.”
This kept haunting me for a few days, I wondered why God was so unfair, to give a good man like him, a woman like that. It just didn’t fit.
A week later, I happened to pass by the pair while walking to my lab. I turned away by instinct but something made me take a second look. They were walking together laughing, perhaps sharing a good joke. I was speechless, caught in an amazing realization about this woman. Something about her was special to the man, she made him smile, she made an extraordinary difference in his super-ordinary life.
Many of us fail to see the obvious because we are too busy painting our own pretty picture. We say we are honest and love life as it comes, we fall in love and then write bestsellers about how it died away, overlooking the very reason for why we love them.
If you ask me, I think that’s why arranged marriages work in India. We are forced to lead the rest of our lives with someone and everyday getting to know that person is turning one more page of a book. Spending years doing that and growing old with that book could be a deep inexplicable feeling.
In love, we claim to have read that person, know them completely, not willing to turn any more of those pages assuming we are aware of everything there is to know. As funny as it may seem, it is true, or so I’ve learned from observation.
Sloppy Joe may not be a perfect man or Mayhem Maria may scare other men with her smile, but these two could be the two crooked pieces that just fit.
But is there a perfect couple? Is there a perfect match?
Science says nothing can be perfect, I don’t know what you have to say to it though. But then again, there is a definition for everything.
What is a perfect match?
A perfect match is a truckload of imperfections and being totally okay with it! 🙂
What is your definition?