A healthy marriage

From limited interactions with friends and acquaintances, I have come to believe that most men shirk getting married not just to avoid responsibility but also obesity. Personally too I have seen so many of them suddenly bloating like a pig within 2 months of their respective wedding dates. I agree, the first couple of months after a wedding is very hectic. It takes a toll on the health of most couples. Most couples most certainly fall ill. They should be totally down and out. On the contrary, most gain weight!! And why not. A couple has three paternal aunts and two uncles of the groom and two maternal aunts and three uncles of the bride to visit for dinner or lunch. There are two more aunts who are cousins by relations but are closer than the real ones. Then, there are relatives to be visited from the bride’s side. On week ends there are the neighbors with whom the groom’s family has been staying for more than a decade. Needless to say all these meals are very delicious, very rich and highly fattening. If families are non-vegetarians, the couples become dead meat themselves after some invitations! Some say the worst is the desserts course of these meals. I agree. One has to have all on her/his plate and then some more which is served and finally some more thrust on them as blessing from elders. If there are no invitations to go to, there are invitations sent to call relatives and friends home to relish delicacies made by the new bride in the house! One good thing ofcourse is that couples get to know each other’s likings and disliking just watching each other eat.

But during all these uneventful yet ritual socializing, the bride and groom actually don’t get to spend much time together. The newly wedded couples want to do so much for each other. Once all these compulsory invitations have been attended, the couples now get to actually live with each other. Till then they were only staying in the same house. The couple has got fed up of the mention of a lunch or dinner invitation. By now men have started getting irritated of the whole thing. People had been thrusting item after item down their throats. To make matters worse with the reducing number of invitations, the mushy bullying of the new wife starts on the breakfast table. The only meal they can eat at peace is breakfast. Not because it is light but because it has minimum number of items on the table. And only now the wife can start bestowing her stocked up love. Not her fault at all. But hen neither is the husband’s, I say. There is a limit to everything. Most of the trousers, old, bought and gifted don’t fit on the waist anymore. He has poked a new hole in the belt. A kurta is the best attire nowadays. Huh, something which was worn only by men past their prime most thought! And on top of that, instead of understanding, this wife of mine is making life even more miserable by shoving some more of that ghee laden parantha with the super oily paneer curry. Things like these may be running across some “now conscious” healthy-in-the-mind men. I hope am going right.

I got married this time last year (June 2006). I live in the same city as my in-laws. There are a decent number of relatives from my wife’s side in the city too. I did have my share of invitations. Being Bengalis we are strict non-vegetarians. So, are these the reasons why am writing this piece? Hmmm, well yes and no. Yes, because I could have been among the so many couples cribbing about the post marriage binge sessions. No, because although I had most of the ingredients of a (un)healthy beginning to our wedding, I was rescued. I married into a Tamilian Brahmin family. All invitations were strictly vegetarian, light and very delicious. It certainly helped that I had developed a taste for most south Indian dishes during my 4 yrs stint down south. When all outings were over, even the unending love, affection and mushiness which my wife would shower on me during breakfast and dinner were restricted to a vegetarian diet. It helped me to keep fit, look fit and feel fit. I remain a non-vegetarian with most week ends with my wife and friends being strict non-vegetarian binging. A little alcohol surely helps cleaning the biological system too!! (Wink)

In all sanity I can say that I had a very healthy beginning to my married life, remain healthy all through this past one year and continue having a very healthy married life. And sure, it includes the meals we eat.