Barren | ✓

l a v e n d e r

feminism is a heavy word.

every summer, my parents take me to my grandparents' place that's far into the countryside.

being a city kid, it always makes for a very serene change to be amidst nature and peace until i step foot into their threshold.

the next thing i know, my identity is dissected.

every year, every time.

you're too skinny, you're too boyish, you're getting tan, you're getting sharp, you're not sitting the right away, you're not walking the right away.

heavens knows that i hear enough of this in high school to hear the same record at home.

my mother gives me a sympathetic look everytime while my father stands up for me, which i love.

but then if i try to do the same for myself, that's not right too.

"you don't know what you're talking about."

usually when things get heated, i silently escape through the back door like a coward, leaving my parents to fight my battles in the way they can best.

there is no winning though, even i know.

the fields stretch across miles, filled with blooms of different flowers and i choose my favourite route.

cycling my way through the narrow denses, i reach the end of the line where the blooms meet the lake closeby.

i abandon the cycle and fall back on the moist ground, away from the sun yet surrounded by everything peaceful and whole.

some days i sleep, some days i bring along a book, some days i break fruits from the trees beside.

and then some days, i think.

a lot of times, i hear this word being thrown in the air like an ammunition - feminism.

what was it really supposed to mean?

when i asked my mother a few years ago, it made her awkward for a second, almost as if she was afraid of what it meant.

and then she told me.

"it means that women have a choice too."

"whatever you do mean by that, ma? ofcourse we all have a choice! why is it any different for us or pa?"

"you're too young to understand now, pammy. but when you grow up, you'll see."

it didn't make sense. even now it doesn't.

i am no traditionalist.

nor am i a feminist.

perhaps i am among those trying find a midway.

with each passing year that i've learnt about this phenomenon, i've started reading up more about it. watched a lot of women talk about it. heard a lot of women fight for it. even heard a lot of women sacrifice their social standing for it.

for the power to have a choice.

since when did choice need to be so heavily clad with fancy words that create disparities across cultures and vultures alike?

isn't this the one thing that we owe ourselves in this lifetime?

giving ourselves a choice?

maybe that's why people have to fight hard for it, i try to fathom, as i think back to every time i have to defend myself for being who i am.

starting with my family.

maybe that's why there is a fight.

maybe that's what women are trying to do out there.

let traditionalists not trample over their spirit and let them be who they want to be.

🐙

- a girl trying to understand the battles of a woman in the real world

🐙