Paranormal or Paranoia? I Need a Dose of Optimism.

I think I had a vision. I vision of what I will be like ten years down the road. Let me start at the beginning: the triggers. 

I was on the metro yesterday when I saw something really interesting. I had just gotten in when I spotted a young lady- say, mid twenties- in her work clothes (smart grey dress, light pink shrug and high black heels) looking out the metro window, onto the streets of Dubai. She had a hint of a smile lingering on the corners of her mouth. I didn’t think much of it… after all, I sometimes forget that I’m in a public place and smile to myself like an idiot over tiny things. I even laugh sometimes- it’s gotten me quite a few odd stares. Anyways, this lady continued to look out onto the streets with the sun shining in her crystal-blue eyes. I noticed that she was still smiling. Sometimes, the smile stretched and floundered on her sunlit face, laughing along with her sunlit eyes, glowing like her sunlit hair. 

I kept wondering why… I thought that she was probably just having a fantastic day. Then, just as I dismissed her exuberance as pretty much banal happiness (or possibly a medical condition. What? It occurred to me, okay!), she shifted her crystal gaze to her left hand. She stayed like that for a while, just looking down at her hand. I noticed almost immediately a large silver and diamond ring on her finger. She scrutinized it for a while, sometimes with a hint of a smile and sometimes with the smile less on her lips and more in her eyes. I thought I saw a trace of weariness somewhere in there… but I couldn’t be sure. 

Well, I could only draw upon one obvious conclusion: She had just gotten engaged. I felt like taking a chance and congratulating her… but I’m too much of a chicken. She got me thinking about what those eyes would be saying ten years from now. Right now, they’re perfectly blissful; but, what will happen down the line, if she gets married? Will they express the same satisfaction, bliss, content and love? Or will the crystals no longer gleam in the sun, but rather brood in regret and fatigue? 

Seeing her on the metro and later overhearing a heated fight between a couple pushed me over the edge when I got back home last night. Tears spilled onto my cheeks as soon as I entered my room and the first thing I said was “I don’t want to get married.” The tears lasted for about two minutes… they were tears of rage anyways. The thing is, I’m too much of a naive little sentimentalist to ever stick to my word of never getting married. I know the fact that I’ve never had a boyfriend might contribute to my future as a spinster, but I think of it as quite the contrary. It’s not like I’ve never had a boyfriend because of my intense feminism (although, that applies to an extent); I’ve never had a boyfriend because… well, I just haven’t found the right one. Sappy, cliche, moronic, naive, but damn well true. So, technically, that doesn’t really secure my future as a feminist spinster. A sad, hopeful and deluded loser, however, is more fitting. 

Basically, ten years- or so- from now, my twenty-something year-old self will be too stupid to follow my wise 16-year-old wisdom and will, against all odds and recommendations, get married. So, conclusively, ten years down the line, my brain will have shrunk to minute proportions, my passion will have subsided, my freedom will have sneakily slunk off into a hole and my wits will have had it after having seen a hallucination of my 16-year-old self pointing, laughing and chanting “I told you so!” as I right-hooked the dip-shit in my  bed with china from our wedding-gifts stash and foamed at the mouth with rabid fury. 

Here’s to a bright future.

Added later: In retrospect, I think I insulted a lot of married women during this particular rant. Just to be clear, I absolutely DO NOT think that married women have no passion or no drive. On the contrary, they are quite the fighters! I think my fears stem from the fact that I find it hard to picture myself in a happy relationship. Am I scornful of marriage? Definitely not. Am I cynical? Absolutely.