another attempt.....at the pool

I wrote this out very quickly after over-hearing a conversation in the changing room at the pool. I wanted it to be less simple than arranged marriage is often presented.


She'd always used the pool at the gym as a place of escape, to allow her mind to run freely for a change. Sometimes she'd find she'd done 10 lengths and not really thought of anything, like driving the car on autmonatic when you realise you're at your destination but don't remember the journey. Other times her mind would replay conversations, or worry events to death.
But today she could hardly think at all and her crying tears mixed with the water in the pool so no-one would notice them. Her nother had caught her just as she left for the gym -
" Divia, my darling. This cannot go on, You've got your university degree; you've had a good job but now you need to marry"
"But Mum...."
"All the good boys will be taken, You can be 'engaged' for a few more years but you must be attached to someone. Or you will reach 30 like Aunite Kajal and there will be no-one left......."

The words went round in her head. Of course she'd known what was coming,what was wanted, what was expected. But she'd hoped to buy herself some more time with her good job. She did want marriage and children, and she was happy to be introduced by the family to someone suitable in the traditional way, but not now, notyet.

Her mum, and then her auntie who had joined them in the kitchen, told their tales of how waiting had already narrowed her opportunities, that a boy with a good job was already liningup a wife at 22 or 23, and that she was missing the boat.

"What did she really want?" she wondered as she pounded up the lanes.



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