Thank you, my wife!

I am writing this - limiting myself to what I trust is our tradition and taking what I believe is the best of it.

Thinking of the various relationships that exist in our lives, I tried to say what could be the best of relationship that I can get from a person belongs to the other sex. Without thinking anything I could easily restrict myself with just three: friend, wife, and mother. Though I thought it is unfair to ignore a friend, I prefer to escape by giving the neither pure nor fully poisoned culture of ours as a reason. It wasn't as tough as I had imagined - between wife and mother, I find I can easily choose wife as the best - especially when I see my life in its full length - And fortunately I have not asked "Whose love is the best?".

My wife is the one who brought me back to the family life. Me: an average young man who believed and enjoyed the pleasures that are outside the family life and I hoped to continue that forever.

I trusted no one as I trusted my wife from the first day of my togetherness with her. It was a total surrender, happily accepted and it is so mutual that I didn't even realise it. How wonderful it is to be the slave of my slave and the master of my master!

I never thought she would be such a inspiring, motivating part of my life - when everything else fail - even I myself feel failed - she is the one who could set things right for me. Her scornful words can never allow me to stay failed. That is why I take too much pride in submitting my success to her.

I am busy now. There are too many things to do, so many things to bother - to plan - to work - to accomplish - to achieve. I can not spend as many hours as I wanted to spend with her. Even at the best of times, we argue with each other a lot, many times she frustrates me, and sometimes I feel she is absolutely against my thoughts and words. I could even sense the enmity in her doings. But then, I adjust, we adjust, we move on. Things will never be the same. They will change. May be at the age of 60 - I will be content with what I have achieved or forced to act so, that is fine, that is life. And that would be the moment, I will sit alone and realise that I have seen myself in her in all these years. That is why I argued with her. That is why I had taken no decision without her consent. I listen to myself before I take any decision. Don't I? And at times, I do things that I don't agree too - I say to myself that is practical. Oh, that is where I hurt her.

Our arguments and disagreements will continue forever. Just imagining a moment in our life - after 40+ years of married life (Perhaps the only thing I always pray to God is to grant me 100+ years of life in this world). We will walk together in the garden. She will point and say, "How beautiful that yellow rose is!". I will adjust my spectacles and say "That is a white rose!" The sudden west breeze will pick that from the plant and throw it at our feet. I will bend down and take that up - we will laugh together throwing that paper in the dust bin.

I won't say I love my wife. It is more than that. I wish no dictionary adds a word for it. People will misuse it. The only way to understand is to feel it. My wife and I laugh, cry, argue, fight... The future will make me to realize that that is the ultimate taste of the life. The heavenly designer's wise decision is that no single thing can keep us happy forever.

My parents will die. I will see them in her. My friends may fade and disappear. I will see them in her. My children might go away. I will see them in her. I could see everyone who I feel missing in my life through her. I don't think anyone can play as many roles as she plays as perfectly as I wanted it to be. One day God will take her - leaving nothing to me in this world and He would feel defeated because I can go on to live with her memories.

If I know I am dying, then my last few breaths are to wakeup those undead cells of me and to make them summon their full strength to say aloud "Thank you, my wife!"

Kovil Pillai P.