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Guest Column: A joyful 50th anniversary, even during Covid
Many people cross a silver or golden anniversary milestone, but is happiness part of the equation?
A couple of years back, a friend celebrated his golden wedding anniversary. His children made it a special day by holding a party where famous qawwals were invited to regale the audience with the choicest of qawwali. Later, the projector was turned on to showcase moments from the lives of the couple: From when they were young to the birth of their children and then grandchildren. In a nutshell, the entire life of the couple was scanned up to the present times.
This got the wife and I thinking about celebrating the success of 50 years of our togetherness, which by no means is a small feat. In fact, we had started thinking two years ago about it, little realising how 2020 would turn out to be.
However, though to me all days are alike but it’s “in” to celebrate these special anniversaries or birthdays in a big way. Therefore, some plan it in a hotel or resort and others fly to a special tourist destination or go on a cruise. Innovative ideas can be endless.
We were perplexed recently when another friend of mine whose golden anniversary was due before ours did not invite us to a party, wondering how he could ignore us. A few days later, however, we learnt that he had offered prayers at a gurdwara and decided to donate money to needy children instead of organising a lavish celebration. Such gestures are indeed wonderful.
After the Covid-19 global invasion we left India for Vancouver in Canada, thinking it would be safer to go out of India. This was not true because the second wave, as they call it, made it mandatory for us to stay at home there with no one to visit, even close relatives or friends, to contain the growing numbers.
As our anniversary, the 50th D-day approached, it was celebrated in the home environs with just our own family. Of course, our children and grandchildren gave us many surprises by meticulously planning everything like special decorations, ordering snacks, drinks, our favourite food and expensive gifts. Last but not least, there was a surprise Zoom call enabling us to get together virtually with our siblings in India, and other near and dear relatives in the US and Canada.
Covid had changed everything because we could not celebrate the big day by physically being together with our other family members and friends.
However, what mattered at the end of the day was an introspection of our journey of 50 years together. Many people crossed a silver or golden anniversary milestone, but was happiness part of the equation? Were they compatible? Did they enjoy the journey.? Or was it just a forced coalition, a journey that was a tedious, unending long ordeal?
The current generation is smart, people part ways the moment they understand that they are unhappy or that their alliance is not workable.
Older generations were more wary of divorce no matter how unhappy they were.
As we tread in our seventies, having shared good and worst times while standing united, giving each other strength, we cherished each moment of togetherness and felt inseparable.
However, the thought that one of us may have to depart earlier gives us the jitters. It is inevitable that sooner or later, one of us will predecease the other at a time when we have started needing each other more in our old age as the children have grown up and have their own lives.
We would love to live life fully so as to enjoy whatever time is left, without worrying about the future.
