The Weight of 2025
The Weight of 2025
The ceiling fan whirred in lazy circles above Ananya’s head, pushing around the warm evening air of her parents’ house. At thirty-four, she should have been worrying about mortgage payments, family trips, maybe even juggling a career and children. Instead, she was still lying on the same bed she had grown up in, her old school medals and college posters faded on the walls, relics of a girl who once brimmed with ambition.
Her phone buzzed. Yet another WhatsApp ping from her Dad. “Matrimonial match - boy is a software engineer in Bangalore. Please check.”
Ananya didn’t even open the profile. She already knew how it would go. The calls, the polite questions, the awkward silence once they asked, “So, what are you doing now?” The rejections had become a rhythm, a background score to her stalled life. Some said “we need a girl with a job,” others said “too old for our son.” Each no, chipped away at her already fragile self-confidence.
Her chest felt heavy as she stared at the glow of the phone. Thirty-four. No job. No marriage. No independence. Still depending on Amma and Nana’s pension and kindness.
Once, in her early twenties, she had been full of hope. She remembered the day she first joined her IT job after graduation. The offer letter had promised ₹3.5 lakh a year, and though modest, it had been hers -her doorway into the corporate world. But then came the decision that altered everything.
Government exams. The words were still bitter on her tongue. Year after year, she poured herself into them - banking exams, SSC, UPSC attempts. Each failure hollowed her further, until she was nothing but an exhausted shadow. By the time she looked back, a decade had vanished. The IT world had moved on, leaving her stranded with outdated skills.
Her personal life hadn’t been kinder. The breakup still ached like an old wound. Five years wasted in grief, crying silently at night while pretending to be fine by day. Friends had moved on - marriages, children, promotions, vacations. She had stayed stuck in the same loop: regret, exams, rejection.
She tried to break into IT again in 2025, desperate for a restart. But the market had changed. Freshers came with new skills, and experienced professionals had resumes bursting with achievements. Where did she fit? She was too “experienced” for entry roles, too “irrelevant” for mid-level ones. Not getting even an entry-level role, while companies demand experience she doesn’t have.
Evenings were the worst. She’d scroll endlessly on LinkedIn, watching people her age announce promotions, job anniversaries, foreign trips. She would close the app, bury her face in the pillow, and whisper, “Why not me?”
That night, she couldn’t sleep. The clock blinked past midnight. Her mother’s words echoed in her mind: “Don’t lose hope, chinnu. Something will come.”
But deep down, Ananya wasn’t sure anymore. Was this it? A life of what-ifs? Dependent forever? Watching time slip away until nothing was left?
Tears slipped down her face as she stared at the ceiling. If only she could turn back time - go back to when it wasn’t too late. To 2011, the year she had joined college, the year possibilities had stretched wide before her.
Her eyes grew heavy, weighed down by exhaustion and grief. And somewhere between waking and dreaming, the world around her dissolved.
