A Letter To All Men

Dear Mr. Innocent,

You are standing inches away from me in this crowded compartment of the Delhi metro. I see you gawking at me and you turn your head the other way. I fasten my grip on the pole to prevent myself from falling, so do you. The cold steel of the pole suddenly feels warm and I notice your fingers have crept up to where my hand lies.

I move my hand farther away; not because you are an untouchable but because I'm uncomfortable. Don't look at me as if I accused you of harassing me. Not yet anyway. I turn my head around to avoid the awkwardness. But when I glance in your direction by mistake, I find you trying to bury a hole in my top with your gaze. You have the most nonchalant expression I've seen; as if this was your birth right.

Let me tell you in that one minute you got me second guessing everything. 'Is this too low?, Is something visible?, Should I not travel in the common coach anymore?, Was my mom right in asking me not to buy this push-up bra?, Am I to react or not make a big deal of this?'

  
So, pardon me for my upcoming scowl and language. I hope it makes you feel as uncomfortable as you make me feel. You are the reason I have trust issues. You are the reason why I prefer to travel by the ladies coach, why I give the nasty eye to any guy who touches me innocuously, why I don't feel secure even amongst an ocean of people.

In a country where you and I are bound by the same laws and given the same rights; my freedom doesn't taste as sweet as yours. So, the next time you boast about your masculinity and throw your head back, laughing over feminism; remember you are the living justification of why it was ever born.

When I give you the stink eye in public or launch into a brawl over your "slightly" insensitive comment, don't think for a second that I'm creating a scene. Just imagine every "innocent" peek you've ever taken and the degree of discomfort you caused all those women.

Call me shameless if you will, but I won't turn red by your not so discreet ogling. I will not be subjugated to become a victim of this predicament. And yes, I will continue to preach if I can alter the mentality of even a single person.

Yours tenaciously,
Every girl

Where The Heart Belongs

  

                All of us remember the time we turned into a teenager; hormones racing, making new discoveries. But this is not a piece about change in sexuality rather about a change in perspective.

 Actually being 13 is not the qualification for being a teenager. In reality you turn into a teenage when you become a pain in the ass for your parents, when you discover rebellion hidden in the innermost part of yourself and when you start making simple situations around you arduous. So you may turn into a teenage when you are 13 or 16 or 18. No, I did not skip Biology in school; I know the process of puberty and how it’s difficult to cope up with all the metamorphic changes in our bodies.

Something all of us can absolutely relate with is feeling alone. 'You don’t understand what I’m going through', was everyone’s favorite dialogue while arguing with their parents. This is the first time in life we realize that it’s been a long time since our parents were young. In the decades that passed, their normal became orthodox for us and our normal, an unacceptable way of life for them. 

You might recall often feeling trapped, incapable of making sense to them. But as we grow out of our teens we realize it was just a phase, a fogged glass in front of our eyes. Our vision and perception were blurred by an overflowing string of hormones. Our mood swings were only second to that of a pregnant woman.

                

                  But what if it doesn’t pass? The feeling of entrapment, not belonging in your own house. What if while growing up, the feeling only grows? From a phase it turns into something more permanent like a way of life. Your faces match, people often joke how all of you are slightly different versions of the same person but the hearts are just not in place. 

Have you ever noticed the new kid at school? He feels awkward, nervous and detached, with children looking at him as if he were a new species. Imagine feeling like that when you look at your family. A constant reminder lingering in the air that though we share the same blood, you’ll never be one of us. ‘How did you grow up to be so different?’, they ask you. ‘Why can’t you accept me?’, you only ponder.

Stuck playing by someone else’s rules, you feel suffocated. You just want to escape to a place you can feel free, do as you please and where you don’t have to justify your every action. A place where you find support and love instead of rules to obey. Often your own thoughts become your sanctuary. And it creeps up on you that maybe your rebellious days are not behind you, rather you feel a battle building up inside. 

You prefer the company of friends over going back home because it just doesn’t feel like it. How can you call a place home where you aren’t valued; where your absence goes just as unnoticed as your presence; where no one cares what you think or want from life? You live there, eat there, bathe there but that is the extent of your involvement. You are the last to know about anything important and are excluded from the most worthwhile decisions; may they concern the entire family or be limited to you. 

And sooner or later you accept it. Accept right now as something transient, leading to your destination. You walk through life in the search of a place filled with warmth. Somewhere your heart can feel at peace. A place to call HOME.

Life In Grey

          

 Black and white.

 Truth and lies.

 Right and wrong. 

Can everything be reduced to these opposing labels? Do they hold the same meaning for you as they do for me?

For some people like me the truth can be empowering and the search for it can be the engine that drives life. The truth gives me clarity in this world of greyness, helps me figure out which side I stand on. But isn't too much of truth as dangerous as too little of it?

The older we get, we find it easier to stand at the distinction line rather than moving to either side. Reality begins in messy complications and most of what we experience in life lies in the middle, in the 'grey area'. It becomes one of the biggest challenges of life to navigate through it. The line seems to be almost smudged; with the lies looking as appealing as the truth, even more so.

So what do we ultimately base our lives on? My version of the truth, your version of it or the path of deception and deceit. Maybe none of these are the right options and we just gamble with life or maybe we choose the path that promises to hurt the least.