The pop-culture I have grown up with, not just of yesterday’s and today’s but of all the eras bygone — from Shankuntala to Shakespeare and Samuthirakani of the last instant, have all shown me a world driven by the power of love. I cant place correctly where in my life I began to look for that undying, unwavering love or started believing that a life without romantic love is one doomed with loneliness. It’s not just me, turns out. Almost everyone I know set off looking for love inspired by the media they consumed, but each story ended differently.
The real life culture I grew up in and continue to be a part of speaks a very different language. Here, marriage was on the cards since the second I was born and considered a non-negotiable till it came down to it. My house at this point is Preethi’s best pressure cooker, I guarantee, very close to coming undone. As I turn 27 this week, I realize that the opponents that have never faced off in an open ring are in fact reaching boiling point in the two halves of my brain. In a world that has pop-culture and lived culture secretly at loggerheads with each other I suppose it’s the same for several others like me.
If pop-culture tells me that I as a woman must be the object of a man’s desire, and perform the role of the lady of his life, or in rare instances be a woman setting sail to find love and only thereby her happily ever after, the culture I live in expects me to settle in marriage, perform the duty of a wife, of a good daughter in keeping the family’s honor intact, and reinstates that love will follow marriage, and if it doesn’t, at least photos from a grand wedding are available for keepsake. Same goes with being the plus sized woman I am — while what I read, watch and hear expect me to only be the sidekick, either the funny friend-zoned girl or the one that provides comic relief, here I am stuck in the real world’s conundrum where I have to be the good fat girl.
What that means is a fat person who seeks to shed the extra kilos, is constantly at unease with her body, a good person who tries to conform to the set aesthetic and succeeds in reclaiming the love that wasn’t meant for her when she was fat. A good fat girl goes on to have her own story and be its heroine when she behaves and she loses weight. Except that we never see a fat girl’s story in the books and on screens.
So here I am, newly 27, fat and unmarried, sharing some ‘Artidote’ and ‘Thought Catalog’ inspired things that I wrote for myself:
There are pressures that mount as you age. But the only way in which age matters is that it gives you the wisdom to handle the pressures quite well. There is no right age to be married at. Ask yourself if marriage is even the right thing for you.
Don’t chase love, even if that’s the only thing that conservations revolve around. Chase happiness instead, Find out what makes you happy. If it’s your career, work harder but if its not, quit and start all over again. Look for happiness in other things as well; whatever digs you — art, poetry, literature, gaming, trekking, and sport, whatever it is.
When you are happy, you will be ready for love, and it will find you. But love yourself first in solitude and socially. Start with your body. You deserve to love it, and your body deserves to be loved for what it is. Allow yourself to throw kisses at the mirror and work towards a day where you will be able to see no flaws. If you want to go for a walk and get nods of approval, don’t let that hold you back — take the walk for yourself, not because it’s expected of you. When you have a partly grown beard, walk up to the ice cream store that giving away freebies for no-shave
November, before waxing it out, if that’s what you want. Learn to not need love, because you’ll appreciate it better when it finds you. Ask questions about love, how you love and who. Too much importance is places on ‘the one’ and too little on friendships and family that love just as much. Open your heart and brain up for love, allow them to be broken and challenged, and when you are broken build up the courage to try again.
Your body is the way it is — you can do what it takes to accept it, but love and marriage are not a given; they’re choices that could go either way. At the end of it all, live for yourself, and maybe someday we’ll see our lives make it to the fairytales as well.
Archanaa Seker
seker.archanaa@gmail.com
The writer is a city-based activist, in-your-face feminist and a media glutton