I hate weddings.
Maybe because it is a grim reminder for me of the inevitability of growing old.
I am in a stage of my life where I should have already settled in.
I hate hearing crap from the older folks asking .. “so when would be your turn?”. It seemed a foregone conclusion that it’s my turn next or that inevitably I’d end up there.
I hate coming up with lame excuses.
How can you argue with the cycle of life ?... It’s just how things go… You go to high school. You graduate with flying colors. You transfer to Manila to get a degree. You graduate from college. You find a job that assures you of a good future. You find a wife and then you settle down.
That progression is the typical expectation for a great majority of my generation. And more so probably for a great majority of my friends ( probinsyanos, intelligent, middle-income families) .
Fortunately a great niche of my friends are surprisingly atypical. But then even the atypical ones settle down one by one
I detest weddings maybe because I am averse to commitments
Wedding marks a quantum leap in the flow of life. It’s hello to marriage. It’s goodbye to singleness, to freedom, to independence.
I love adventure. For as long as I can remember I have had this lust of going to far flung places I have never dreamed of. This ache, this yearning to commune with the unknown, this insatiable lust for travel has defined me as a person. I have always equated this with the sense of being free.
I love the feeling of going wherever my heart leads me to, of throwing caution to the wind, without worrying about tomorrow, without thinking of anything or anyone.
There is something about marriage that is stifling, constricting. It’s like being tied up to another soul. Decisions that used to be so easy, would now have to be made together. That would definitely be inertia to all life’s adventures.
No.. I love my freedom so much to embrace the married life.
Or maybe I abhor weddings because I have turned cynical.
Oh yes.. Once in my life, I had that epiphany. I met the girl whom I thought would be the mother of my kids. I’ve had a great vision of me spending the rest of my life with her. The images seemed so real and palpable, even as I recall them now. She, reclining on the wooden armchair, watching the sea and the sunset, her long hair billowing in the wind ; Our kids flying their kites on the shores of my childhood.
She had been the singular turning point of my life, my anchor, my compass. She had defined my future.
For that magical moment it would seem that my destiny was forged.
And yet as some love stories go it was never a happy ending. She was THE ONE that never became the one.
My faith and optimism were shaken. I have turned jaded and cynical.
But yesterday something changed. I attended the wedding of a good friend. It was by far the best wedding I have attended. The celebration was not lavish. The number of guests was not astounding. The decoration was not opulent.
It was a ceremony stunning in its simplicity yet intimate. You could feel the sincerity of two souls making a commitment of becoming one. This is what a marriage ceremony is supposed to be.
I admit I almost got teary-eyed when she read her piece during the ceremony. She has been a great friend and I have been a silent witness to her tumultuous relationships in the past. I have seen her cry many times through her heartaches. I have seen her turn jaded and given up almost completely on love.
To see her finally getting her wishes come true was so much overwhelming. So much that my heart would seem to burst.
I am guy who loves happy endings. To see one of my best friends get her well-deserved happy ending was moving enough for me.
I guess deep inside me, no matter how much I deny it , there is still that part that believes in the magic of marriage.
