We invited readers to share stories of how they met their spouses and interesting anecdotes about their wedding day. Alok Kumar shares his account of how he met his wife, thought he'd almost lost her and won her hand!
There will be times in each one's lives when you can't choose what's more important, Friendship or Love? And we never thought we would have to make a choice with the OR separating the two.
New place and new friends was the Mantra when we joined the University of Roorkee. And when Shraddha and I joined a society for some voluntary social work, we were already a part of larger circle of common friends.
We started off pretty normally, though being on the opposite sides of the astronomical charts -- Aries and Libran, we often found ourselves on the opposite sides of the discussions. Shraddha, being the coy one -- never did much of the talking; but when she spoke, she did give pretty good insights to aspects I had never thought about, both personally and academically. She always had something different to what I said, not necessarily opposite, but yeah -- different.
We kept on getting intrigued about each other, and our fascination to knowing the other better -- kept on growing. Though we had so much more uncommon than common at first, but ' the opposites attract' phrase came into the play I guess.
Gradually coming to know of our likes and dislikes, we already had developed a connection, but were afraid to accept it in our own minds.
Firstly, we were too good friends to risk it for unequivocal feelings. None of us wanted to be there alone without the other one.
Whenever we would be apart, we used to be on phone (with the onset of mobile revolution), or chatting or talking about each other to our friends. (We dedicated "Doston sei jhooti moothi " song from Saathiya to ourselves later on).
Secondly, bringing out the "Love" word could very well being the end of "Friendship" word. And then both of us had a traditional upbringing and being eldest of our families were expected to be role models for our siblings.
Finally, one person had to spill the beans, and I being the boy had the honours of doing so.
I tried a couple of times before going away for my final year internship, to let her know about my core feelings, that I never wanna be separated again. But being so shy as she was, I never had to guts to come out that far and spell out my feelings in words.
One fine day, I decided to be "sick" at Internship and boarded a bus from ISBT, New Delhi to Roorkee, where she was for her Summers. Never knowing what will actually be the outcome of this sojourn.
Past couple of occasions I had tried calling Shraddha up and letting her know of my feelings, but declaring it and getting rejected on phone sounded more terrible.
I gathered all my courage and when finally I confessed my feelings, she had nothing much to say as usual. And now I had to confront my worst fears of losing her as a friend.
She convinced me once again, being opposites as we were, that I was not taking the right decision. I tried all I can, but had to return empty handed dreading that not only have I lost the chance of having a life partner, but also had given away my best friend for something which I didn't even knew existed -- perfect soul mates.
But she proved my fears wrong again, and despite all my crankiness and irritating gestures, despite both of us not being comfortable of discussing our future lives,
We continued to talk and remained friends. By the time session started again, I had given up my dreams of a soul mate and had accepted that fact that as long as I don't lose her as a friend, I would find solace and peace in life with whatever I did and whomever I married.
We tried to remain as normal as we could in front of our friends, but this time around she had probably come to terms with her own feelings and when she finally proposed to me, over the phone.
I was completely in shock. I had after feeling dejected and torn apart for those 4-5 months accepted the fact that we could probably never be together.
Well, we met again on a beautiful morning, discussed once again as opposite sides of the argument, but by the end of the day we had convinced each other to be more than just friends -- a soul mate.
Next few years, we kept in touch mostly on phone, our professional lives keeping us in North and South India. We decided to take the next step and get married.
Just like it took us a while to convince ourselves, we had to take time to explain it to our families and then even the astrologers (our horoscopes weren't perfectly matched), that we were in fact made for each other.
And when finally the D-day happened, we couldn't get over the feelings of not being able to talk to each other, despite it being the most important day in our lives. Somehow, in between the hectic processions and rituals, in the midst of those 600 odd people (we don't know all of them till date), when we were able to exchange the same old looks and glances on the stage, that it seemed to be the perfect day in our lives.
We got married on April 26, 2007 after knowing each other for seven years, in courtship for over four years, and this year we celebrated the Whole Decade of togetherness.
Share your romantic experiences with us! Write in to getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'My love story') along with a photograph of you and your spouse if possible and we'll publish the best entries right here!
Just make sure you include the following information:
Where and how you met your partner
When you shared your feelings for each other
An interesting incident from your wedding
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