Turning 22 and the Art of STILL Remaining Single!!

I am turning 22 in another 4 months. Growing old scares me and soon I will be pushed to a situation where I will be made to choose a guy to live with the rest of my life. Only 22years of living in this world has mademy parents to pressure me into this.

22years of living - well that includes 2years of working experience. In the corporate world, 2years of working experience is nothing. This being my case, my close friend calls me up on a early sunday morning to ask me for an opinion and help her out of it. Apparently she has a year less experience in working than me. Now her confusion is to choose between her career which has just started and marrying a guy. She has a deadline by Jan 2009 to get married and if she misses it she gets to renew it only by 2011. Sad right? "Iyer guys" wish they all stay in India. Somehow they manage to get settled or work in a froeign country :( pathetic situation... What will this poor thing do when she is married to the guy who will have to go away from India? With just a bare work experience she cant establish something new outside at the moment...

Why cant she marry at 25? Well the question is a bad one I tell you because men (Iyer men) these days prefer "A professionaly qualified Home Makers". For what joy is left to god! Poor gal toils until 12th to get into an engineering college and again toils to compete in this unfair world with her counterpart and when it comes to her career she is expected to forget it for the sake of "men folk and family" per-se. Back to the confusion in decision making - Career or Marraige? If she misses her marraige now she will be forced to marry someone when she is 25. 25years is the worst time to get married. The gal gets to meet too many men and is very happy with her financial independance. With the clause of matrimonial Home Making, she will be devastated totally. So the end result is her career is at stake either way.

Forgeting all this and god loving her she gets a very understanding guy where she gets to compromise little, I came with 2 suggestions -

1. Marry by Jan 2009, Work hard for a year until Jan 2010 (living apart) and get a very good work where he is which is very much likely to happen. short term living apart, long term happily lived ever after...
2. Make a guy fall in love with you, who understands your need for a career, then marry him as and when you please.

Neither of them was accepted by her and she has now chosen to marry by 25. I then was forced to warn her of the side effects -

1) Her biological clock will start ticking faster when she is 25.
2) Her choice would be limited.
3) She will have to cater to her mother's cribbings which will be much more than what it is now.

Anyhow life is so complicated and a girl is with so much pressure to decide between career and her marraige! I always wondered why men are the bread-winners?? Its her life; her decision. Hope it turns out to be the best for her...

All said and done, I always believe in there is always more than a solution to a given problem ;) Life keeps going on inspite of any number of problem one has till one dies!