Today I celebrated my wedding anniversary with my husband. All this time I’ve been married, I am surprised at how more often I was asked why I decided to get married rather than congratulated for being married. I think my friends often see me as a free-spirited person rather than someone that actually really appreciates commitment, but considering how I spent my youth, that view is totally acceptable.
Previously I often felt afraid to write about my marriage and romantic relationships. I had the experience when I deeply loved some people whose minds inspired my works and wrote about them (sometimes in this blog), but then they let me down. At some point in life, I decided to stop relying my happiness on something or someone. That was liberating, very much actually. Blessed me, I found someone that is mature enough to feel the same way while still can appreciate my presence. And that was when I decided to marry that guy.
Someone said to me once that becoming an adult means to take decisions that we never know where they’ll take us. We never know whether we’ll be happier or dismayed, but we take the risk. That sentence, which was said to me in fieldwork - in the middle of nowhere, left a deep influence on me. No one will ever actually guide us in adulthood. Parents will give advice that might work for their generation but not ours. Mentors would never see from our own eyes. Friends would only give some friendly suggestions because maybe they are afraid to hurt you, to tell the truth. So we are on our own. My discussion with my then-boyfriend was that marriage is a good thing for us to learn to be together in this journey and to have each other’s back whenever things go wrong. And that’s all; there was no romantic proposal or flowers. Just a quick discussion after having some personal time to think about it. That’s a decision my husband and I will never know whether it will end sound or be bitter.
After years of spending time with this person, I realized that a healthy relationship is hard work between two people. We came from very different circles and worlds, but we decided to compromise. When I got a call from my lead researcher to get on a plane soon to help him in the field, he let me go because he tried to understand what are the most important things to me. We back each other to cook if the other one is busy with meetings or video calls. We compromise with each other’s weaknesses and take it as a daily joke. He’s not romantic to society’s standard - but I think there is nothing more romantic than when one doesn’t understand the academic world but is genuinely happy when I gets my scientific article published or a funding request granted. Without the need to feel competitive or belittle my smallest achievement, I am sure this is what a healthy relationship feels like. Without the promise or complex conversations on feminism, he always helps with the chores and feels the obligation to share any domestic responsibilities equally. And the best part is that he always takes good care of me whenever I'm sick (my Dad said someone who really loves you is not the one who's there when you're healthy, but when you're sick, and it's true).
I hope it’s not too much to say that I still hang on to my speech at my wedding dinner, that I agreed to marry him because though we have everything in the world to be different, we have similar fundamental values of life, and that’s enough. This is a person that I can say is done with himself, that I would say has a way of thinking similar to an F1 driver that doesn’t want to drive on a public road - because he’s afraid to speed up the car and kill someone. He is my daily reminder to always acknowledge my own limits and what I am capable of, and that is far more important to me for becoming a better human being rather than wordy love letters.
Happy anniversary, my love. I am privileged to have you.
