Every time my phone rings, I mentally prepare myself to cut off the next telemarketing executive who desperately tries to sell me an absurd credit card or life insurance plan with a blunt “sorry, I’m busy.” But, this time, as I got up from my desk to answer my phone, I was pleasantly surprised to see a familiar name flashing on the screen. “Oh, great. We haven’t talked in a while and there’s always something crazy he’s up to,” I think to myself as I cheerfully greet my friend with a “Hello! What’s up?” After a quick exchange of unimportant details that follow the rhetorical “what’s up” question, my friend has an unusually happy tone to his voice. I’m left slightly curious and cannot wait to hear what he has to say.
I didn’t have to nudge him any further and he voluntarily blurts out something that makes his voice go ecstatic and leaves me with a moment of silence as I still try to register what I just heard. He goes on to narrate how he met someone recently and thinks that she is the one.
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“Wait, what? The one?” I sheepishly ask.
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I should be happy, and I am happy, but I have this extraordinary feeling of discomfort in my tone that I cannot hide. He goes on and on about this girl and how she has swept him off his feet. Somewhere in between the conversation, he says he wants to marry her, and if things pan out the way he has imagined, he’d be overjoyed.
Oh no! Another best friend getting married, I think.
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Right there, I am speechless and I realize I cannot form sensible sentences when I’m preoccupied with thoughts that are now filling my mind like wispy clouds in the sky. A series of thoughts are passing through my mind, like scenes from an old 1987 movie. The sepia tone of these scenes reminds me of how we first became friends. I cut these scenes short and try to concentrate on what he is saying; again, I’m a little distracted. Yet, I don’t say anything that truly depicts what I am feeling deep within.
In short, I’m apprehensive and a little sad because I am going to lose yet another friend in this war called “marriage”.
For a very long time, I have dealt with these feelings every time a close friend got married. It’s like losing my friend who has been a part of me to another person. The feeling is a combination of jealousy and insecurity because there is now a third person between us, and a volcanic fear built in my head that my friend will change after getting married. So there I was, standing in silence as I hung up the phone, feeling like a complete idiot for being a little selfish and not being as happy as I should be for him.
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I often questioned myself as to why I felt this way, is this normal? Or am I being weird and overprotective of them? But then, I console myself that it’s only fair that I feel this way because I have loved each of my friends so dearly that it would break my heart if something, or rather someone, took them away from me.
My friends have been an integral part of my childhood. They are people I look up to for their innate qualities such as their knowledge on a variety of topics and I would often take their advice and discuss my fears, insecurities, inabilities, and boyfriends (funny, I have to mention “inabilities” and “boyfriends” in the same breath!). They are people who I often lean on for approval, emotional support, and encouragement. So when I imagine that this person who has been a close friend of mine for years will now soon be sharing our time with their significant other, I am bound to think that I will lose a tiny fragment of them that rightfully belonged to me once upon a time.
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I fear being replaced by someone else. My fears reach a high point if I don’t know the spouse too well, and initially, I show hesitation when I meet them. That’s only because I see them as an equal contender to our friendship and I’m worried that the appearance of this third person in “our” friendship will leave one of us getting hurt. It may not always end up like that because sometimes I have gotten closer to my friends’ spouses and like them better than my actual friends too! But, that is a risk I’m taking, rather reluctantly.
So, what’s the fuss about marriage and how does it change anything between two lifelong friends, you may ask. Well, marriage does change people, and it creates either a bridge or a gap (totally depending on your spouse) between friends. There is an uncertainty to the whole situation, a slim chance that I will still be friends with my friend once they are married and also the increased probability that it will change the whole ballgame between us. But, the kind of friendship you two share also plays a big role in this equation.
With most of my friends getting married to people I already know, I feel assured that we aren’t going to drift away easily. But with one of my friends getting married to an unknown person, I tend to get a tad bit nervous and anxious because our lives can now swing either way and the future of our friendship begins to look bleak.
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I’ve had friends who I’ve lost to holy matrimony and I cannot stop myself from thinking that the holy matrimony has indeed taken the life out of our friendship. You see, priorities change and the sudden “happiness” of marriage blinds people so that they forget about the world and all its beings. No, I don’t blame them; I guess they felt the same way when I got married too. Your spouse and your friend cannot be at par with each other all the time, and somewhere down the line, you are able to give only one person your undivided attention. No prizes for guessing who that person will be. Secretly, I will be happy for you and will want for you to have that beautiful relationship that exists between two people who are tied together in what the world calls marriage.
But, what happens when friends getting married turn into mere acquaintances post their marriage? How does that happen, you ask?
It happens for reasons unknown to me, and it has definitely happened to me in the past. A friend who changed quicker than a chameleon changing colors, and by that I don’t mean they turned into a sly monster, but they did stop doing things that “we” used to do – things that defined our friendship, time that we used to spend together, and the closeness we shared. Almost suddenly, I felt replaced and discounted. I had no one but their spouse to blame for their unwarranted behavior towards me. So don’t take this the wrong way, but, this has happened to me in the past and I am prepared for it to happen again.
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So every time I hear about one of my friends getting married, my past fears come to life again and haunt me. I am certain that I feel exactly like the father of a bride who knows that his daughter is going to go away from him, although she will always be there, her absence in his daily life causes his heart to feel a bit empty. He did raise his daughter for 20 odd years, spending time building a bond that he discreetly fears will be lost after she marries the guy who he isn’t very fond of, or perhaps even hates! But, he will swallow that ego and be happy for her because he knows that this feeling is inevitable and there’s nothing one can do to stop it from happening. He will cherish the times he taught her to ride a bicycle, picked her up from school, and watched a game together! He only wishes that she still calls him Daddy with the same adoration and affection, and that she will always be his little girl.
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So, dear friend, when you take that plunge and stand at the altar with your partner, a part of me is going to hate that day because I know from there on, you will be a different person. A person I might or might not recognize a few years later because of the changes that marriage brings to the table. I will still hold you close to my heart and cherish all the times we spent together. The time we spent on the school playgrounds playing hide and seek, the numerous hours spent talking on the phone about what life has in store for us, the time spent just sitting in the same room going over the same things time and again, and our good-natured banter. The time we spent riding the streets recklessly and waiting for the next morning only to spend more time with each other.
I will be reminded of all those things that made up our childhood and our journey into adulthood, where we were inseparable. It will probably bring a tiny tear to my eye. I will blink very slowly and carefully so as to only let the tear roll down my face without attracting any attention or shifting the focus from your important day. I am really happy for you and mean well. I hope you understand but it’s really hard for me to see my friends getting married.
Featured image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License
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