You ask. C replies

Q/Dear Mis C, everyone is asking me to get married as I am well past the proper age of 25 years. No question of a love marriage, arranged it is. But please tell me how do I know who is Mr Right by just a bio data and a couple of guarded conversations?

Yours J

A/Dear J, you probably represent half of our country’s marriageable female population when you speak of your dilemma. It is difficult I admit to judge for the Mr Right especially since it is a hypothetical character. There never is a Mr Right, but just personalities, temperaments, characteristics which might be right for you. Sinceyou already have let go of the thrill of marrying the person you love, then emotions shouldn’t be of much issue in your deliberation. So to play safe in such a case you just take into account two things- let the financial and social viability of the said person be judged by your parents as you see they are more experienced about the ways of the world ,while you take a check of his personal charecteristics. If he possesses none or shows no affinity towards the points which are the eleven grounds for divorce , then you are safe, comparatively safe I would say and can go ahead. He may not be your ideal Mr Right for you but I assure you he will not be wrong for you either.

Q/Hi Miscellany, Iam getting married in coming January. Though I have known my fiance since a long time and whom I know as a very nice man, I am feeling a bit apprehensive of having to stay with my in laws as I hardly know them much and have met just a couple of times. What if they do not cooperate with me?

Sim

A/Dear Sim, remember those days in our childhood when suddenly one day our parents would declare officiously that some distant cousin whom we had never met would be visiting us and that we would have to share our room with them? Do you remember how we used to complain back then? If it is difficult for you to go and stay in a new place with near strangers, it is also equally difficult for them to incorporate a new member to their close knit family and share their space with you. But then time flies and we adjust and finally become close. It is a gamble I know. Sometimes it may not click. But you can contemplate about their cooperation only after you have done your bit. Don’t worry my dear. We survive a new school, new friends, college, office…Surviving a new family will be as easy as those. Just go ahead and do your bit. But if, still if, it doesn’t click, then mail me again.

Q.Miscellany, I am ashamed to say that the members of the other sex considers me quite a catch, the tag I detest most. I am a man who really values promises and like to keep a word once given, but there is a small hitch, I am commitment phobic and this has led to a couple of unpleasant scenarios. Why is it so? What do I do?

A: Wow! A catch. This is the first time I am talking to a catch. I wonder I wonder..on a serious note, your predicament is not a surprise to me. The fact that you realise or are convinced that you are a catch as they say, makes you fear a commitment. No of course I wont consider you that frivolous so as to remain a commitment phobic for availability of options, but rather you are such because you don’t see yourself valued the way you would like to be when girls tag you objectively as a catch or even when they innocently adore you. As usually seen, the first girl you will fall for will be the one who treats you with utter arrogance and though you may be correct in assessing that she realises your true worth but it need not be essentially correct. You have to come out of your mental block because this block has in turn blinded you and may have resulted in you overlooking some genuinely nice girls. Just remember that you are better than a catch for people to like you the way you are. Now decipher that

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