Who I was, I no longer am. Who I want to be, I do not know. Whether I will have the courage to stand up for who I think I am remains to be seen! Whatever shall be done needs to be done by me alone.
I have no more words and right now, I have no wish to go looking for them either!
I used to believe that if nothing else, my words shall remain mine always… How? They will always be true to who I am. Not the I, that you want to see and not the me you want me to be but just ME. It is why writing has always given me such joy.
My words are tainted. I knew that. They are no longer mine because they are no longer my truths. I knew that too. They too are coloured by my understanding of what I know people would want to read. And I don’t really care. It is just random… the word ‘Bullshit’ comes to mind rather strongly.
Knowing who I am, and what I do and still continuing to deceive myself about the way I cheat myself is routine.
I don’t expect people to even see past what I show them. So, realizing that not everyone is blind and there are people who actually see enough to show you a stark truth about yourself is bloody daunting!! And that little bit infuriating too! The normal rules of the game are no applicable.. It is no longer your sandbox. New ground! And there is no comfort zone… Except that…
I know I can take what is said at actual face value. Consequently, I have no choice but to respect and face the challenge to be true to myself. Eventually! How many people actually encourage you to do that? I may not do that right now but maybe one day I will. On the other hand, how many people would actually want to keep coming face to face with someone who keeps showing them a mirror they’d rather bury along with Pandora’s box?
The cauldron inside my head is bubbling a little faster today. It always does when I try and make the effort of taking myself in hand and sorting my head out. Ashamedly though, I always back away from that first little step because I am scared of getting tangled up in the unravelling that will follow… I was told sometime ago that I’m brave because I’m not scared of the dark. Purposely pulling at the string that could take apart the cocoon that keeps you safe and secure takes a lot more courage than just going into a dark room.
There is no place I feel safer than this dark chrysalis of my own making. I remember an English lesson from long ago where my teacher likened a caterpillar’s cocoon to a tomb where it sleeps without a care… untouched till it can turn into a butterfly. She said nothing can force the caterpillar out till it is time and it is ready to emerge. But she also said there were times when within the shell, it turned to dust with all the beauty and colour that could be, reduced to nothingness.
What will I be?
“…..
….
….”
Such potential in the empty places I see today! Rather than nothingness, I can see a glimmer of all the things that could be.
Today, I don’t want to think of all the things that can go wrong.
The untimely death of my computer last week thanks to the incessant blessing showered upon us by the Islamabad Electric Supply Company left me literally twiddling my thumbs. My i-pod ran out of power and as I still have not bothered to get an adaptor it was bye bye music. In addition, have been run off my feet thanks to 15 gloriously loud individuals crash landing at our place over the last weekend.
What else? Am also suffering acute exam phobia. Not my own exams you understand… Over the past week, have had to suffer the agony of invigilating during 4 sets of exams at the end of the term and then had the agony quadrupled when checking the papers. I still have two stacks of answer sheets and reports glaring at me malevolantly from the corner.
The weather doesn’t help. Seeing Islamabad at it’s virtual best with the grass greener and lusher on the hills in the horizon thanks to the rain and then being covered in moments in a sheet of pure white reminded me of some of the reasons I love this city. It’s just that this weather doesn’t really motivate one to buckle down and study or do any kind of work. As a friend put it,
“it’s perfect ‘mush weather’ which is wasted on single people like you and me.”
And as Psyched darling put it so eloquently during one of our late night yak sessions,
“you know a girl is single when she can’t be bothered to keep her cell phone close by.”
Or something to that effect… I love these conversations! 😀
Although, having been through the ‘single to double to single status’, not being bogged down by incessant whinings, gripings, and the baggage of unfulfilled expectations and emotional burden that comes along is so much easier. When I look at myself, I see the times in my life where I have literally bent over backwards, sideways and twisted myself inside out to please anybody who has literally thrown a scrap of attention my way. It’s strange. My usual common sense and reasonableness deserts me if I get the slightest inkling from somebody that they like me? Why? I don’t like knowing that my emotional dependence on somebody can get to the point where they can manipulate me. That is what relationships do. I wonder if all women are that… can I use the word stupid? Affection? We sell ourselves for it. A word, a glance, a smile? Even the hope of it can push us to do so much… even that which we do not agree with but will put ourselves through to see a pair of eyes shine, for just that single moment when they look at us. I knew the words to be false, the gestures to be plastic, and feelings to be fake and I still allowed myself to fall. How strange is it that for all I know I can be, and for all I have it was the statement below that I could relate with:
“I am nothing special; of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts, and I’ve led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I’ve loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough.”
The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks
View from a Jade Window 
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