A Cowboy's Sweetheart

Three days from now, I'll be sitting at home, eating mom-made food and being pampered like mad. And I can't wait, but at the same time, I dread all the questions I know I will invariably be asked and which I inevitably will have to answer.

'What have you done to your hair?'
'How long do you think you can live like this?'
'When are you going to get married?'
'Don't you think it's high time you start thinking of settling down, get married, have kids..?'
'When are you going to get married?'
'So, found anyone you want to marry yet?'
'So, found anyone who wants to marry you yet?'
'When are you going to get married?'
'Don't you even miss us at all?'
'When are you going to get married?'
'Do you realise your biological clock's ticking?'
'When are you going to get married?'

And oh, did I mention 'When are you going to get married?' ? ***GROAN***

But since I have already premeditated a lot on that, I know exactly what I'm going to tell everyone - 'It's not my fault we don't have cowboys in India!'
It's not that I don't want to get married at all, it's just that the man I have in mind has just been too elusive.

Remember the Marlboro guy? Yeah, him. Well, that's who I want to marry.
I grew up in a house filled with country music. Both my parents have always been ardent country-music lovers, my dad especially more so. Our house was always filled with the music and voices of Willie Nelson, Don Williams, Kenny Rogers, Alabama, Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Crystal Gayle - you name them, we had them all. And I grew up with country in my blood.

And while all the other girls my age dreamed of Cinderella's and Snow White's blue-eyed blonde princes, I dreamed of my own version of Jesse James, a man smelling of leather and cowhide and tobacco, with a few days growth of stubble on his face, walking with a swagger and his spurs jingling as he climbs onto his horse. At night, we'll sit together near a campfire as he strums on his guitar and sings me old country songs, and we'll sleep out in the open under the stars like the way Dan Seals sings about in 'God must be a cowboy', and we'll both live wild and free and happy. And later, when we get older and our kids have grown up, we'll sit out on the porch as the sun goes down, two old, grey-haired, satisfied cowfolks - reading cowboy poetry to each other. My man won't smell of expensive colognes but of the country - like a real cowboy, I'd think whenever I'd watch my dad splash on his Old Spice aftershave.
But then I grew up. And I found out, much to my chagrin, that we don't have cowboys in India! Not in Mizoram, not in the south nor the north, not anywhere at all! My friends used to tease me about my cowboy-obsession, telling me to go to 'Thenzawl'- a small village in Mizoram where people rear 'Sakawr te chi' - a kind of pony - the closest thing to horses we have out there.
Anyway, what I'm getting at here is that I am still foolishly waiting for the cowboy of my little girl dreams. I know it's not gonna start raining cowboys anytime soon, but then, one can always hope. And the thing with feathers still perches very firmly in my soul. So till then, I'll keep my fingers crossed that my cowboy comes find me one day and while I wait, I'll just continue to dream...

...and smile to myself everytime I hear The Prairie Ramblers singing 'I want to be a cowboy's sweetheart' on my iTunes radio.

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