For the longest time, I couldn’t picture my future. When I tried to think of it, I managed to conjure up only a hazy vision where I was pottering around alone in a house somewhere. A house that wasn’t a home. A house that was never filled with the love and eagerness of somebody waiting for me to come back home. But last night changed everything.
You know the whole thing of Dykes on Bikes… yeah well, I’m that dyke. And although I would be on the bike even if I was ramrod straight, somehow, I have been cast into the stereotype by virtue of being gay. Damn.
In order to get my ‘happily-ever-after’ with a Ms. Pilgrim of my own, I need to take matters into my own hands and defeat my 7 Evil Exes, who are totally to blame for the untrusting commitment- phobic adult that I am today. Pfffttt…what does Freud know? It’s not my parents or my subconscious…it’s my very own League of Evil Exes! So let the Ex bashing begin!
The sextravagana continues… (always wanted to use the word ‘sextravaganza’)
I never realized I had fallen for you. It was only when you told me that you were falling for someone else that I felt my heart beginning to crumble. I know you kept telling me not to expect anything; that you couldn’t offer me what I wanted. But how could you have known that you were made up of those very things I expected in the person I thought I could fall for?
My first sexual experience, with my first boyfriend in high school, was brought upon me with coercion. This sexual experience did not happen on my own terms. This doesn’t mean I didn’t eventually enjoy it or that I didn’t still fall head-over-heels for him, but this wasn’t how or when I had wanted it to happen.
“But what if I don’t trim? My shining personality will have nothing to do with making the relationship work? My mind? My looks? My body… barring the alleged untrimmed pubes? I mean there’s so much that can make a relationship work but you zeroed in on the pubes… the thing that was lowest on my list of probables…no wait…it wasn’t the lowest – it was non-existent!”
And as your biggest and dearest fan, I take the responsibility upon myself to bring your attention to this atrocity!
Now that I have your attention…
Some of the bloggers say all the “good ones” have been taken. Hey… I am right here. And I am good, believe you me. And I’m not taken. But that’s just the point – we all are the “good ones” in our own eyes
When you share your inner most self you allow for recognition to happen. Sometimes we are afraid of being seen for what we are and this in turn causes us to fear being available to a world we long to enter. The greater damage is how we cease to be a vivid presence to our own selves. We choose the wrong mirrors and have to deal with false reflections.
I seem to have a problem. And freezing in mid-step, like Jim Carrey does in Mask, when it comes to making conversation with attractive women seems be to the very least of it. Turns out, there is something wrong with my vibe. Should have smacked me right in the middle of my face, but like with everything else that involves a combination of subtlety and the art of self-observation, I only recently figured this one out. Apparently, being single most of my life wasn’t a good enough hint (Sigh. Some people are so daft, I tell you).
But there are moments, when you know in your heart, that you did what you could – nothing, no force, could have made you give any less or any more. That is the point in your own evolution and inner growth, when you know that you have peaked, at least for the time being, until life prods you towards the next level.
I was 21years old when I met her. Right from the start, we never had a name for this thing we had. Or have. I don’t know. I didn’t know then and I still don’t know. It’s all so mixed up in my head – the beginning, the middle and the non-end. Tangled up so much that I doubt there will be even a semblance of order in these words that come pouring out now.
The one memory from rush week that stands out the most is from the fondue night. We had the fondue night at one of the sister’s houses and she asked her straight roommates if they wanted any fondue. One of them responded with something along the lines of “ewwww I’m not sharing fondue with y’all and your vagina fingers!” Yes.
I’m thinking of the women who were a part of my life at different times, women of all ages, from different backgrounds, in different circumstances. With each one it was a unique journey on a different road, but when I look back, I see that the milestones were probably the same. We started as acquaintances – bumping into each other sometimes, calling each other for some bit of information sometimes, sharing a ride sometimes, meeting for coffee sometimes – doing all the normal acquaintance-y things that people do, with the keyword being ‘sometimes’.
Thousands of books have been written on Mahatma Gandhi with each new one claiming to have discovered an unknown facet of his eventful life. When reviews of Pulitzer prize winner Joseph Lelyveld’s “Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India” hit the newspapers in England and US claiming that the book says Gandhi was a bisexual and had a German-Jewish bodybuilder lover in Hermann Kallenbach it created immediate sensation.
The train towards HUDA City Centre was rolling into the platform, and I hurried to reach the last coach, which I was usually found to be less crowded than the others. I made it comfortably, and waited for the doors to open. At this time there were fewer people boarding the train, and I hoped to have a comfortable ride for a change. The doors started opening, and that is when I first saw him.
It was a big fat Tamil brahmin wedding. You can imagine the setting. From Kancheevaram clad Mamis to Silk Dhoti Mamas, from adorable little girls dressed in their Pattu Paavaadais (silk skirts) to young ladies just graduated to Sarees, the wedding hall was overflowing with guests. The hall, beautifully decorated with jasmine, roses, lotus, and Javvanthi flowers, looked colorful, heavenly and royal. Traditional Naadhaswaram and Melam instruments added to the festivity. The priest who was seated in the center of the stage was totally in control of the event.
“A Person may step into the past for a short time, to find something of herself she left behind or to understand the persistent ache of an old wound. Many times such a journey brings its own healing. At worst, she may simply put it behind her and go on”. – Namet, “When Women Were Warriors: Book I”
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