ENDEARMENT OR EXHIBITIONISM?

I chanced upon a facebook “status” today. A wife had posted a very “mushy” message wishing her husband a happy birthday. There was mention of how they had met and how many happy years they had spent together blah blah followed by  the Happy Birthday message. And guess who was the first person to hit the “like” button?- obviously the husband! 

Call me cynical but I was wondering what was the need for  this considering that they were in all likelihood together and she could have wished him directly ? Even if they were not together on this day, she could have called and wished him – after  all what are telephones there for? My husband with his nasty sense  of humour tells me with a grin “May be that is how they communicate”.

While I am all for display of affection – PDA or otherwise, I draw my lines when it comes to PDA for PDA’s sake. If you love someone and you want to spontaneously hold his/ her hand then sure go ahead  but holding someone’s hand or hugging someone  just to prove a point that you are in love is nothing short of exhibitionism!

And conversations… god! How false can they get… I was on a train and I heard a woman on her mobile talking to someone loud enough for people two cubicles away to hear. From the tone of her voice it was clear that she was talking to her husband giving him a laundry list of things to do / check up on while she was away. And guess how she ended her conversation ?  “Love you”!!! I guess the guy at the other end must have been some sort of a masochist!!

This “Love you” is  getting on my nerves. I hear teens using this on each other so often that it fails to mean anything …It almost sounds like the American term “honey”.  I am convinced that American couples have trouble remembering each other’s names and that was how this “honey” thing emerged. My cousin who has moved to the US has also been afflicted by this amnesia.. she has switched to calling her husband “honey”.  I guess she might have felt that if she had called him by his given name her American neighbours may have thought  she was calling the dog …!

I remember there was a time when there was an Indian slant to this “honey”/ “honey bunch” thing – “Jaan”! I think it was  later discarded as being too cliched or filmi.

While agreeing that much of social behaviour is  learned , what I fail to understand is how much of what we do is because we believe in it and how much of it is because others do it ? I mean, we cannot live a Yashraj film as our life can we?  While life does derive inspiration from art what beats me is why is it important to demonstrate this to the world ?  Are we so insecure in a relationship that it requires such behaviour to make us feel a sense of comfort? Or are we so used to watching displays of affection in movies that we feel some one ought to watch us enacting some scenes or mouthing dialogues? It saddens me that these acts may have become so hollow that they have ceased to mean anything between the people who are involved other than may be proving to the world that they care for each other! It is almost like celebrities performing for the media.

People who genuinely care for each other do not have to announce it to the world. It is so obvious to anyone who sees/  them together or happens to overhear them when they are talking to each other. The chemistry around them cannot be missed. They, on their part are usually oblivious to the world around them.  It is only with those who try hard to convey to the world  that “All is well” that there may be an  issue of “All not being well”.

What do you think?