Strength

I hate being called weak. Or anything that might come close to the truth. As a fact, I would collapse entirely in the face of a struggle and there are people that have guessed that. But I would never let anyone vocalise that sentiment. And definitely not to my face. People might see me strong if they catch me in a moment of passion. Sometimes in an opinionated sort of stance or if they see me striding down the road. But that is how I want to look when I want to look strong.

The only people who have seen me curled up in the pose that comic strips take endless jibes at—the foetal position—are parents and family. They are the ones that see me in the throes of a temper tantrum and I wonder, do they see me as strong? I doubt it. To them, I am a spoilt, whiny brat with demands and no way of fulfilling them myself. I seem to be the one constantly storming in and out of rooms. Throwing about a nasty attitude with the smell of a battlefield of rotting carrion.

They are the ones who see me for being rather arrogant and very intolerant; the perfectionist with a broom up her arse.

Oh! And the maid. Yes. They seem to see me in my moods all the time. And the neighbours, doubtless, hear me. Because I shout. And scream, and wail and yell. And the rest of the family has a vague idea that I am the shrew…and not in the style of Elizabeth Taylor. And I’m betting my friends have a decent idea. And then there are all the people that these people talk to. And the gossip spreads. Some people look at me warily. Like a cousin I have.

And none of this is a statement of pride. Just a statement of ‘me’. And that I know all these things about me. And that there are days when my attempts at change are earnest, and there are days where I revel in my spiny, thorny demeanour and wallow in the most delicious sense of being the dragon. But none of it is pride. Just acknowledgement that my immediate family fears me. I disappoint me.

I have received nothing but the best from them and they have been nothing short of poetic. But there are those times when the freaks are awarded to the best in the gross injustice that the good suffer. And so, someday, I hope to do them some paltry credit; become an academic luminary for one thing.

But all those hopes are just that. I might finally end up being one of the notoriously ungrateful because that is what they think I am. And, I guess, that is how I appear.

C’est la vie.