I am not an expressive person and when it comes to talking about
my personal life I get even shyer. However, the lure of a gift voucher and an
opportunity to write about one of the rare things I have done in my life to
express someone’s importance in my life, decided to go ahead with it.
Considering the picture I gave above regarding myself, it isn't hard to guess that I had an arranged marriage. There was no courtship,
followed by realization leading up to proposal. Well, it was one of those new
age arranged marriages where there is interaction before closing the deal,
however, the intent from the start was to explore marriage and the only options
were, get married or forget about the whole thing ever happened and move on to
the next prospective match! Sounds clinical, but that’s how it is. Well, I am
sure there are people who can turn this into a courtship and proposal routine,
but none of that for me.
Given not much was done earlier, I tried few things later on
to make it interesting. Small things like hiding gifts in unusual places, and …
maybe that’s it :(. Amidst
all these banal attempts, there was however, one that I would call a really
successful one and if I have to think of a way for proposing someone, I will
gladly convert the same idea into a proposal.
She was gone for a while to visit her parents, my parents,
relatives, basically a fairly long visit to our “native” as we call it here in
South India. I had time in my hand and got some ideas on creating albums for our
family. They look like picture books, literally like books with your pictures
in it. I created many of those, but the one in question was about how I met my then
future wife for the first time after speaking to her on phone for a month or so
and then all the meetings in between and so on. Speaking to her on phone, I was impressed with
a few things, not so impressed with others, but at the end few things were
clear. We were completely different people, but if there was someone who could
tolerate me and stick with me, it was her and if there was someone who I wish
would do this for me, it was her. I guess, rest of the stuff, felt less important,
though it manifests itself in our daily lives, in the form of constant
disagreements but we never hit each other so I guess we are good :).
So, I was shameless enough to click pictures of our first meeting
and she didn't mind either. We never proposed as such, but talked in general
that day and absence of any no, meant yes from both the sides. Once official I had
the pictures of all the other time we spent together leading up to the marriage
and then our first anniversary. So, I collected all those and arranged them in
a nice sequence and got that book done.
Now, she was back and this time also there were the usual
hidden gifts, and I guess she was already bored with that. Over the weekend, we
decide to go to a mall. The two of us were roaming around in the mall and reach
to a studio with all sorts of fancy personalized things. I suggested we explore
(or maybe she did as she likes all these things) and so we go. We checkout a
lot of sample mugs, t-shirts and then reach the album sections. The moment we
pick the album, she is frozen, sort of petrified, not knowing what happened,
and whether it was real. It was “our” album with us on the cover page. Well, that
was a “shock” very well received and I felt all the preparation that went in
was worth it. With support from my brother who coordinated with the studio on
that day to put our album out in the samples at the right time.
So, this would be my proposal, except that the
last page instead of holding the picture of our first anniversary, there will be
a question, the big question! It will be an all in proposal, completely
documented, leaving no room for saving your face in case things don’t work out.
It will be bold. So go forward, take the cupid challenge and make it bold if you are looking to do it.
