Tug of War!

She was tugging at my hair trying to calm down the waves and i was looking deep in my eyes reading the quagmire of dreams and fears i was losing myself into. I was the un-tameable just like my hair and today it was being harnessed! But why was i giving in why was everything shaping up in shapes i did not consider befitting me; i was being driven into each of those molds. It was suddenly as if all the planets decided on a whim to line up against me. An aspiring New Yorker was trying to settle for a fake of Big Apple manufactured in India. Consolation was i could at last live in this lovers paradise. But as if with every perfect deal there is a fine print which they did read out aloud though at a sprinting pace. It soon occurred to me that this paradise was still under construction, the worst i realized the workers were fleeing off the site. But being a twenty something, i am an incorrigible romantic and foolishly hopeful about the next day, year, decade and even my old age. Everyday when i lay down my head watching my favorite sitcom and smiling in my sleep dreaming about the days to come. But waking up into a nightmarish reality that i am the same but my circumstances are not me and this is not where i thought i’ll be. I just find myself drifting far off from my ideal self. The one i thought i will construct out of myself.

“Who we are” and “who we desire to be” are always on a plane but opposing each other at 180 degree angle. I wonder when the boundaries will ever blur here.

But it is a threesome in this place, there is also this one person we pretend to be. SO there is who we are then who we would want to be and the one who we pretend to be – who is that? where does it stand in the tugging. Is it more on the side of who we are and not letting us who we want to be or is it on the other side towards who we desire to be. But then the pretension should just make us super models or billionaires or whoever that aspired self is. So many times we discount many calling them pretentious but aren’t we all pretending to be someone who we are not. I remember that day when i scared the lizard out of the house just to prove that i was the brave enough to, but still thinking about it makes my skin crawl. Pretending to be generous, giving out an aura of “ I am the Queen of this world” but deep inside we feel like a homeless freak. I am beginning to believe that it lies somewhere in the middle, it is not letting us sink deep into the unwanted reality and not let us float into the fluffy dream. Pretension is our survival tactic, our defense mechanism.

Our reality, our aspiration and our make believe self that is who we are a struggle, a war we need not win.

Tanushri