I Married a Total Stranger
I Married a Total Stranger
While I craved privacy in India, the lack of neighbors and family dropping in left a shocking void every day as I ate breakfast and lunch alone. My husband worked late most evenings, and I sat in front of the TV, unable to call home because it would be 2 a.m. there.
Being away from India gave us the chance to get to know each other. The first few weekends we spent like tourists — a trip around Manhattan on the Circle Line, a romantic view from the top of the Empire State Building. My husband bought me fashionable, sometimes sexy clothes, and we tested each others' boundaries. We talked incessantly about our childhoods, schools, friends, mistakes, hopes, dreams, and desires. It was just like dating, only we were already married.
After a few weeks, I learned that I'd married a "jetrosexual." He had an exhausting travel schedule (four cities in four days). I joined the ranks of corporate wives who saw every show, opera, and ballet in town, just to fill the hours.
To make friends, I joined a gym, went to the library, and took Italian classes. I discovered that having an arranged marriage was a great icebreaker, and my social circle mushroomed each time I retold my story.
As peers in India opted for motherhood and worked on post-baby waistlines, I took Spinning and pole dancing at the gym to work off exotic dinners of sweetbreads, foie gras, chocolate mousse. After reading about America's obsession with Venti decaf skim mochas, I went to try one — but came back instead with a spiced chai latte. Amazingly, Starbucks was providing my childhood drink on every corner.
Marriage, I soon learned, wasn't easy — especially to a modern man. My husband had acquired a mistress, and her name was BlackBerry. She had the power to stop discussions midsentence, her red signal lighting up his face in the way I only dreamed of doing.
With his work schedule and my burgeoning social calendar, our love story unfolded on fluorescent Post-its stuck to the fridge: "Water plants." "Out of toothpaste." "Make baby tonight." Nothing, it seemed, was left to chance.
I Married a Total Stranger
While I craved privacy in India, the lack of neighbors and family dropping in left a shocking void every day as I ate breakfast and lunch alone. My husband worked late most evenings, and I sat in front of the TV, unable to call home because it would be 2 a.m. there.
Being away from India gave us the chance to get to know each other. The first few weekends we spent like tourists — a trip around Manhattan on the Circle Line, a romantic view from the top of the Empire State Building. My husband bought me fashionable, sometimes sexy clothes, and we tested each others' boundaries. We talked incessantly about our childhoods, schools, friends, mistakes, hopes, dreams, and desires. It was just like dating, only we were already married.
After a few weeks, I learned that I'd married a "jetrosexual." He had an exhausting travel schedule (four cities in four days). I joined the ranks of corporate wives who saw every show, opera, and ballet in town, just to fill the hours.
To make friends, I joined a gym, went to the library, and took Italian classes. I discovered that having an arranged marriage was a great icebreaker, and my social circle mushroomed each time I retold my story.
As peers in India opted for motherhood and worked on post-baby waistlines, I took Spinning and pole dancing at the gym to work off exotic dinners of sweetbreads, foie gras, chocolate mousse. After reading about America's obsession with Venti decaf skim mochas, I went to try one — but came back instead with a spiced chai latte. Amazingly, Starbucks was providing my childhood drink on every corner.
Marriage, I soon learned, wasn't easy — especially to a modern man. My husband had acquired a mistress, and her name was BlackBerry. She had the power to stop discussions midsentence, her red signal lighting up his face in the way I only dreamed of doing.
With his work schedule and my burgeoning social calendar, our love story unfolded on fluorescent Post-its stuck to the fridge: "Water plants." "Out of toothpaste." "Make baby tonight." Nothing, it seemed, was left to chance.
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