A Diary of Separation, Ep.2: Mad Dog and Glory

Ep. 2: Mad Dog and Glory

" we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,

we shall fight in the hills;

we shall never surrender" (Winston Churchill)


Funny, how a single word or a single decision can become a landmark in your life. Funnier still when this word is such a simple one that we use everyday but we never really mean.

On this day, I decided to Just Say "No"

* No, you cannot do whatever you want , whenever you want.
* No, I cannot accept being taken for granted all the time.
* And No, I will not let it pass for this time only.



Doing that, I hit a solid wall called Acquired Rights.

For some inexplicable reason, when one agrees to a certain situation. He is, almost certainly, expected to agree to similar situations in the future. Why is this, a somehow, fair assumption?

However, even more puzzling is that by time one loses his right to say "No"

Whatever, you have given up willingly (or unwillingly in this particular case) becomes an Acquired Right for the receiver. To change your situation or say no is met, at this instance, by fierce resistance. And a vicious territorial war starts.



"Never let the sun go down on your anger" That was perhaps one of the first and best advices I got when I got married. But as the relationship drifted and we grew further apart, even small differences were becoming increasingly difficult to patch. The song goes "All You Need is Love." This is not true, I am afraid. There is so much love can do by itself. Without understanding, compromise, kindness and mutual respect any relationship, no matter how passionate, is really doomed. So by time, efforts are stopped, angers are well left overnight and small fires, eventually turn into infernos.



This is where I was on this bleak December day. I have said no, took my stand and put my foot down.

I still felt deeply for my wife, no confusion about that. But, I could not stand the life we were having. We are in love, I assured myself.

* All I am asking is just some compromise. Any relationship is a two way street based upon giving as well as taking. I said to her.

But, I could see it in her eyes. A mixture of surprise and anger. Surprise that 7 years of taming the husband have gone in vain and anger of the thought of giving up her spoils, already won and secured. She was not going to surrender an inch of her invaded lands, not a single item on our negotiations list. For some reason, she made up her mind this will be a dog fight and a fight to the bitter end...