...once in love

I have loved someone so intensely I almost forgot who I was; so deeply I drowned in the same waters I created to supposedly bathe him with a love I haven’t felt before; so big I lost all strength to carry it in my back alone, letting it crush me soon after.

So I have loved someone with all my heart only to end up being killed by its same enormity.
Artwork: Paula

And you can’t tell me love can’t harm anyone. Isn’t there a song about it already? That too much of it will kill you? Murder you? Torture you? Set you ablaze?

So I have loved someone in a way I myself haven’t understood quite fully. I just knew it was there, raggedly breathing, struggling for life every single day.

But then the worst storm came and the ugly realisation of being never loved back by the one you adore most hit me like the waves of Typhoon Haiyan striking the shores of the Philippine islands–obliterating everything in her wake, leaving nothing useful, almost unbearably and unbelievably leaving nothing for tomorrow.

There has been this one period when I seriously thought I wouldn’t make it through, when I just stare at the ceiling, laying flat on the floor, carelessly chasing my respiration patterns as horrible panic attacks came. I remember people looking at me with those puzzled eyes, eventually concluding that everything was an act for attention when in reality you beg for none but peace. I remember his unfeeling words that made me realise how tiny I have been for him–me and my feelings, me and my thoughts, me and my capabilities, potentials, tomorrows, and nows.

So I loved someone and got the worst heartbreak in the history of my life.

And then he came.

You know those days when you’re in the middle of a scorching summer and then the rain came? And it isn’t just a passing drizzle that’s gone just before you enjoy it. I’m talking about torrential rain pouring all of a sudden, not just moistening and damping the cracked and dried-up lands but more like nourishing it and washing away all the dusts and weeds, making it healthier, allowing it to be fertile for flowers to grow on.

That’s what it’s like.

It came almost instantly–the healing. You know when you’re in the worst mood of all time then suddenly you’re favourite vent song came in the radio and you can’t help yourself but sing your heart and lungs and oesophagus out? When you’re in a horrible day and then you saw the dusk and all its colours and suddenly you tell yourself it’s a great world and  a great life and a great time to start anew.

It’s like you screaming with all your might to declare you will never love again, and then suddenly, just suddenly, you did again.

That’s what it’s like.

So I have loved and had suffered the worst heartache in my book.

And then there came someone that washed away all the pain almost too snappily. Almost too sudden, too unreal, too unreasonably fast.

That’s what it’s like.

That’s what it’s like since he came.

Yes, Kangana is a WITCH

A newly married young girl, who smoothly adjusted in her new role as a wife, was once told by her in-laws that she had probably cast a spell on their son as he always supported her, sometimes much against their wishes. What they probably could not understand was that it was no magic that had won her husband over but the love of the woman.

In fact, it is not unusual to see women being labeled or called names. A recent controversy where an actress was called a psychopath and a witch in the same breath should not really shock us. In our society a strong woman who wins personal or professional battles without support is usually not applauded; instead, people busy themselves in finding a reason for her success as if there was a prize to it.

At work, when a woman earns an impressive increment or that well deserved promotion, people in hushed tones discuss why she had it so easy which usually ends up with an affair or closeness to the boss. Obviously, nobody cares to recall the long hours spent and the project deadlines that she has met almost every time.

In our society, the easiest way to put down a woman is to hit where it hurts the most. Point at her morality or question her sanity and you have instantly got a strong, independent woman questioning herself.

It is our society’s inability to accept and deal with women who know what they want and work to get it without playing the damsel in distress that brings out this insecurity. The fact that a woman can do it all and get what a man can get exposes a helplessness that can only be cured if it throws back the woman back to gallows of darkness. Where she must cry and beg for help. In this age old power struggle, it is scary to let any woman rise. It is because, a successful woman would inspire her clan and that can turn the tables overnight in our patriarchal society.
So a woman who expresses her sexuality and chooses her own life partner becomes a slut. A woman who has a sharp mind is usually the black magician who burns the midnight oil while pricking voodoo dolls. And God bless the woman with a sharp tongue. She is the worst of them all. For it is this woman who questions and answers back. No wonder, in this side of the world, everybody wants a well educated bride so that she can be shown off as a trophy but nobody wants her to speak!

Thankfully, the new breed of  women have developed a strong immunity towards all this name calling and are striving harder than before to attain their individual potentials, while the world is left gaping too awestruck to call her anything but a STAR, and a magical one at that!