All names have been changed to protect identity
“Our fate, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars but in ourselves ….”
This couldn’t have been truer of the matrimonial alliance forged between Vishal and Rima, where, like so many alliances, their marriage was set up on a purely transactional basis and where Vishal’s mother, Karuna assumed that the partnership between her son and his wife would work out as smoothly and flawlessly as one of her sari-selling sessions which she often held in the living room of their apartment and where she displayed beautiful handspun, silk and embroidered fabrics.
Among many of her clients, most of whom were friends, Antara was a regular who sometimes visited with her daughter Rima, to check out on the latest trends in saris, have a cuppa and replenish her wardrobe. A few months into the friendship, Karuna began matchmaking in her head , forming fanciful notions about Rima and her son making a perfect pair.
Not one to be left behind, as many of her friends’ sons were getting married, she set out with formidable gusto to start making arrangements for the wedding. To be sure, a perfunctory introduction took place between Vishal and Rima, who was a working professional, there were discussions with her parents, some outings and in due course, the nuptials were held.
Within a few months, however a work assignment took Vishal out of the city while his wife had to stay back. Communication between the couple was fairly frequent for the first few months after which conversations started dwindling with the relationship becoming weaker until it was discovered that Rima was in an affair with one of her colleagues. Vishal’s irascible disposition did nothing to assuage the situation and in a matter of months, the relationship crumbled and ended in divorce.
Matters could have ended there but they didn’t. Being heartbroken and disillusioned by the whole thing, Karuna and her husband started consulting astrologers, often ending up with half-baked ones who could not actually offer any valuable advice. A number of visits to several astrologers only resulted in further confusion with each one giving different interpretations of Vishal’s natal chart and some of them offering expensive remedies. Not one single prediction matched.
It often occurs to me as it had in the past, how people can charge for services that have zero accountability. In the meantime she had been bombarding me with WhatsApp messages and pictures of her son’s natal chart, since she knew I dabbled a little in this subject.
Being a zodiac Aries with the moon and ascendant in Gemini, Vishal was an amiable individual who was generally very sociable. Jupiter in his fifth house had seen him successfully through school and college and he was now an accomplished software professional. However, the main hurdle lay in the path of his marital journey which should have been handled with greater insight and maturity; that however, did not happen as he was coaxed and coerced into getting married a second time by his mother.
This alliance apparently seemed to hold promise of better understanding between the spouses as it was a second marriage for the girl, too. I had the occasion to meet Preeti at the wedding reception and later, too, and found her only too eager to please and adapt; unfortunately the pattern appeared to repeat itself as Preeti, being a successful software engineer had to return to her place of work which was not where Vishal was. Though the initial months and the honeymoon period had been euphoric with Preeti remarking that it was one of the best periods of her life, the first signs of disintegration had already started to set in.
For Preeti, working was not only a question of identity but it also augured financial security as she had suffered a bad marriage earlier and refused to be vulnerable once again. Conversely she wasn’t willing to wait hand and foot on her husband and relinquish her career. So, a year into the marriage, Vishal’s patience began to wear thin as he had expected his partner to come and live with him, which did not happen.
The parting this time, however, was amicable without any undue drama or misunderstanding on either side. These repeated failures in marriage were taking their toll on both the parents and the son, with Vishal becoming increasingly ill -tempered. Undaunted, his mother set about bride hunting with renewed vigour, sending me photos and details of the girls’ birth charts, fervently hoping that this time, her son would not be “ wronged”.
All good advice fell on deaf ears as Karuna continued to adopt the ostrich approach and remained adamant in proving her son’s innocence and integrity as opposed to the girls who refused to “adjust”. The amateur astrologer that I was, I had to do a detailed analysis of the various periods, sub-periods, moon and sun signs, constellations, the lords of each house and so on of all the charts she sent. Time and again I advised Karuna to let Vishal just be; to no avail, of course.
Anamika entered the picture in the third round. A two-year courtship consisting of phone calls , messages and cafe dates culminated in their being proclaimed man and wife. Fate, though had other plans and within months Vishal was posted abroad which is where he had always wanted to be but this time again he had to leave his wife behind as her visa was not ready.
Was it only the position of Ketu in the seventh house that was creating so much discord in his marital life? This would be simplifying matters a little too much. Delving overly into the intricacies of how the planets influence our lives might not always provide the right solutions. The general approach towards astrology, whether adopted by lay learners or questionable practitioners of this science tend to focus very superficially and that too only on one particular aspect, usually a negative one . It must be remembered that sometimes even good planets do not give the desired results which they are supposed to bestow and it is the amalgam of several factors that forms the composite. In this case, Ketu did have an impact but in addition , the position of Mars made him extremely aggressive and Saturn was creating obstacles in his path.
A couple of months later, though, Anamika joined her husband in the USA. Life, as she had envisioned there did not match her expectations. Within a few months, boredom began to creep in and being unable to find a job , her frustrations expressed themselves in erratic behaviour like petulance and mood swings. To add to her woes, news soon reached her that her mother had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer; the only option left was to return to India and take care of her mother which she has been doing ever since. In the meanwhile, she has taken up a job here which seems to be a clear indication of her not wanting to leave the country anytime soon.
The picture at the moment is: Vishal flies in and visits his parents occasionally and that’s when Anamika comes to stay with them and spends a few days together. No one knows when but perhaps sometime in the future, they will be able to live together. Not satisfied with this arrangement, Karuna tried to change her son’s destiny once again by consulting various astrologers as she had done earlier, to no effect, though.
In the meantime there were few efforts to review the picture in its entirety. Vishal’s shortcomings were shrugged off and so were his pleas at her dominant role in trying to play the matchmaker. Money has literally gone down the drain with lakhs being spent on astrologers and their remedies without getting any of the desired results. All this started taking their toll on her and recently she had to undergo a heart procedure. On hearing about this, my first reaction was to tell her to stop fixing things in her son’s life and let him move on. Without any hesitation albeit sheepishly, she admitted that her sisters and other friends had been advising her to do the same thing and that she was trying .
There was a lull for some time and I thought that good sense had finally prevailed; apparently I was wrong for Karuna called only the other day, with her tale of woe, anguish pouring forth from every fibre of her being. She was going to expose the “fraudster” astrologer, she raged. It transpired that the last one she had consulted had not only cost her a fortune but was now refusing to see her or answer her calls. Needless to add, that not a single prediction had matched and Vishal keeps blaming his mother for ruining his life. Karuna’s desperation in finding the right astrologer brought forth certain questions to my mind.
And that is, people are seldom prepared to face reality. And in their quest to make everything perfect for their children, they often impose their beliefs on them. Assumptions can be the mother of all misunderstandings leading to havoc at times. Perspectives differ, so do circumstances and having blind faith in such practices only makes one susceptible to various kinds of exploitative deals bringing a lot of financial loss, emotional distress and psychological damage in its trail.
Having been privy to this drama unfolding before my eyes over the years, I really didn’t need any chart to indicate the mother’s role in the son’s life and I was proved right. As I had estimated, Mars was in the fourth house, which is a clear indication of a controlling mother who thinks that only she has her son’s best interests at heart and that even an adult son is incapable of making his own decisions. Restlessness and anxiety of disposition are some other classic features of Mars in the house ruled by Mercury. Over the years, the relationship between mother and son has only aggravated with each being pulled in different directions in a tug of war of misplaced emotions.
Just as Ketu in the seventh house can create distance between partners it can also be indicative of having life partners from different communities or different cultures and ethnicities. Similarly, in my experience, I have noticed that Rahu in the partnership house does not always cause divorce or break-ups , neither does it imply having an unfaithful partner. The mismatch can be manifest in varying degrees and forms and most people work their way around, if they decide to stay on.
A horoscope, it must be noted, is only a framework or a basic structure giving certain indications which should not be followed for day-to-day living and should be judged in its entirety. The chafing, turbulent waters of life can be navigated with greater ease if only one pauses to breathe and review unpleasant experiences as lessons to be learnt and move forward with greater awareness and positivity.
