A Woman’s Divorce Ceremony

Yes, I am divorced. No, this post is not about why I divorced. There are always stories behind why a union ends. But stories are stories. I am not here to recount them. I am here to share how I moved on.

He and I were always intellectually and psychologically astute. When separation was looming in, I found him writing some of the most searing poems I have read. Like that one on the fragrance of jasmine in a yellowing, musty room (yes, all said and done, he is/was an incredible poet). I, on other hand, gravitated towards social work.

We both knew that cultural symbols and metaphors hidden in the cultural unconscious play a significant role in healthy social lives. We replay consciously or unconsciously ancient cultural myths in our day-to-day lives. So, after a period of grieving, he went to Varanasi and conducted funeral rites for me and emerged from the burning ghats of Benaras as a new widower or so they say.

I, on the other hand, was a woman. A Hindu woman. I could not muster the strength to conduct a funeral rite but did burn his many memories. And before I knew it, I had embraced the garb of the Hindu widow.

Therein lies the problem. The Hindu widow, specially the middle-class Hindu widow, in spite of Vidyasagar and others’ valiant attempts, remains shrouded in a set of virtues that is injected into your behaviour in the silence of the sleep.

Here I need to pause and caution my readers. Do not even for a moment think I was a coward playing the goodly Sati Savitri. Upon my separation, I descended on the University of New Mexico with an unparalleled intellectual fury, massacring many an established text in my doctoral seminar classes, writing and presenting research papers that questioned and probed uncompromisingly, and burst into the activist scene with a speech at a Human Rights symposium in the November of 2003, titled “Violence without Bloodshed: the Tyranny of Tradition.” The speech won me some lifelong friends and supporters and left one Ugandan man in love.

Rather, while I did everything intellectually and socially to challenge established norms, without even realizing it, I was psychologically losing the battle to the inner cultural sense of morality and ethics. As they say, the inner battle is the toughest battle.

Like all women, my body longed not just for nights of passion, but for the comfort of a man’s presence. That ritual that we build around our partners—of how we wake up, our morning routines, and the food we cook, and the trips we take, of those family get-togethers, of common friends, and perhaps, even more importantly, that knowing of each other’s presence—of that knock on the door, of that TV channel blaring, of that old Hindi music, and of that familiar touch.

And yet, as a widow, I could not get myself to desire so. But if you are thinking, I avoided men. You are wrong. I simply never allowed a romantic relationship.

Folks who contemplate divorce do not often realize how the mere loss of a daily ritual is terrifying—of the moments I held myself together in that living room in my apartment in New Mexico as the snowflakes fell and the cats disappeared, of the hurricane that brews in the heart, of the desperation to flee from this pain, to ease it in some form.

(Those who are in this phase, no worries, it passes! You may want to listen to this song to cheer you up--I am so lonely).

Worse, the role of widow pivots human desires around the presence of The Man. In the absence of his caring aura, you do not desire, want, wish, enjoy, bathe in all that life offers. You do not want to pick flowers for your hair, slowly and surely the desire to buy that lovely new dress ebbs and you suddenly find yourself guilty of wearing kohl in your eyes. And soon your attire, your outlook, your attitude has changed.

It took me many years to realize the change in myself, to diagnose the reason and then to find the solution. 

There was a need for a “rites of passage” ritual—like we have for marriage, for first pregnancy, for childbirth, for the first birthday, for puberty, and heck, even for widowhood! There is none that allows a person to properly integrate after a divorce.

So I searched through hundreds of mythic Indian stories in the hope of finding a woman who had divorced in the hope of some cultural legitimacy for my status that re-powered my inner being. I wrote to mythologists requesting information on how women divorced then, if they did. None that I reached out to could help or did help.

 I then created a ritual for myself —a public divorce ceremony. This ceremony is not to mock our traditions but because a gap exists in our cultural memory, a gap that unfairly dehumanizes a woman’s spirit, I offer mine to that treasure trove.

I invited five of my closest women friends—some married, some single, and a dog who I considered my Guardian Angel to participate and witness the ceremony. The steps of the ceremony:

1.     

          In presence of the invitees, I asked for a divorce saying:

“In the presence of all of you—the five women, my guardian angel, and the five elements of nature I declare I need to leave my husband XXX.  I have loved him deeply but now it is time for us to go our own paths. There was a higher purpose for our marriage—that we complete the debts we owed each other. The debts are now paid and I now seek dissolution of this marriage so that each one of us can go our own paths and fulfil our destinies in this life. I seek a divorce in peace, light, in radical acceptance and in humility.”

2.       The invitees declared:

“We declare this marriage is dissolved. You both may go on your own paths.”

3.       Then I confessed:

“But I am enveloped in grief. My heart and mind are shrouded in despair, guilt, and shame. I call upon all of you to help me emerge into love and light through this purification ritual. Let the turmeric paste be a healing balm on all the injuries. May the sesame oil bring me into balance. May the water cleanse the soul.”

4.       The invitees chanted:

“May this turmeric heal you!

May this sesame oil bring harmony within you!

May this water cleanse you!

May you be purified!”

5.       After the purification ritual, I presented myself to the invitees again, saying thus:

“Now that I am purified, I come before you afresh and seek my new clothes and new hope. I seek your blessings of prosperity, love, grace and beauty. Bless me and welcome me back to my journey.”

6.      

 The invitees declared:

“We bless you with prosperity, love, grace and beauty. May you fulfil your higher purpose in this lifetime and may you find yourself supported in this process!”

7.       And then we had a small feast.

 I stand witness that this ritual worked wonders for me for I stepped out of sadness and re-embraced life with joy and enthusiasm. My friend’s circles have tripled, I enjoy anything new or old, my curiosity has returned ten-fold. I am eager to learn new things. I enjoy dressing up and I take up projects with gusto.

This photograph was taken couple of months after the ceremony

Yes, there are still days and nights when I go into the bat cave and my spirit hangs upside-down, but the days are becoming shorter and my spirit more robust.

And yes I am single but comfortably and happily single and open to the little miracle called life!

 If another woman can benefit from this experience, then please do share this with her as a sisterly gift from beyond.

 [Thanks all for having patience with me. I have retrieved most of the comments that were lost in cyberspace and have added them back in. If your comment is missing do let me know!)