Choices

Monday: My sister is to be engaged this week on Friday. In what is the world’s worst kept secret, her boyfriend of two years is planning to pop the question and whisk her away to London to live happily ever after. The parents, as is tradition, met 3 weeks ago, and decided all the dates for the formal functions before the poor guy even had a chance to propose, so in the time since, she has quickly cottoned on, and knows that whenever this inevitable proposal happens, it will be before December 11.

Tuesday: We are shopping for my sister’s engagement. She now knows not only of December 11, but also December 13 and December 17, which are other events to mark this joyous occasion. We have been to at least 5 different stores in the space of 7 hours across Mumbai, and in each place she has gleaned one more detail because of my mother and her to be mother-in-law’s excited exclamations and oops slip of the tongues, and of course the dates by which final alterations need to be made.

Wednesday: My sister has given up any hope of being surprised, as she is being consulted extensively on décor and food. I tell her she has only herself to blame for being the most aesthetically sound (maybe a close second to my Mom but definitely top 2) person in our family. She is also busy choosing clothes for the rest of us, and her will-be husband and his family. She now also knows that she is being proposed to on the 9th of December, as her would-be fiancé has accidently let it slip while we brainstormed wedding hashtags.

Thursday: Since it is her last day as a possibly unattached person, we take her out to celebrate her “last fling before the ring.” A small intimate dinner, and many glasses of wine, and conversation turns to choices. It’s very hard to choose — the right outfit, the correct location, the wedding date, initially even the right guy. “How can you be so sure,” we ask, from the other side of the table.

“It’s just a feeling. When we’re together it feels right. I didn’t realize even that I was choosing him. It just happened and now it feels right.”

And I think about this and I think about how complicated it becomes when we’re aware of choosing and when there are too many options. How really the only thing that matters is the feeling that it “feels right,” and that it’s okay to make several decisions before you stumble on this “right” feeling, whether it’s clothes, volunteering opportunities, or anything else really.