Khyati ParekhAll Joined and Disjointed – but I had to say it all. (Also, I am an idiot)
The wave and nod of the watchman or sabziwala or the old lady with the sun-baked skin, are not part of their work or role description. It is their contribution to the community.
The lady who picks the fights with the building Secretary while the rest of us roll our eyes, is keeping the ‘powers that be’ honest. And the rest of us can chill because she doesn’t!
The colleague who sides with the quietest co-worker.
For all the unacknowledged roles in society, why is nobody sending all of them a thank you card atleast, every Diwali?
Why is everybody not feeding atleast one more person outside of their family, everyday?
Why is nobody calling out the bullshit of the stereotypes that is the beauty and the fashion industry; and, but, in a sense all of culture and almost, civilisation?
Why is nobody calling out the ridiculousness of a 5 or 6 day, in office, work-week?
And the absolute wretchedness of nubile and macho as descriptive words for young women and men? These words are making me retch.
Why is nobody calling it out and saying that Nobody, not a single one of us will eat or work or rest or do anything else, till we have zero crimes against women? Zero tolerance, zero negotiation. I do not have the stomach for logic and discussion. The platitudes given and swallowed are making it now, positively hard to live. This is table stakes. Like food, and education. And the liberty and safety of men, is.
Why is no one saying – I will clean the Mithi river or work through the garbage dumps at Kanjurmarg. Surely, it can be done. We’ve, after all, put a man on the moon some 50 years ago (Apparently, in 2024, we might just put a woman! I am not kidding. Please google this.*) Why are women an afterthought? Are we not people?
Why is nobody insisting that everybody write ‘daily pages’ everyday? The introspection might make this world a better place.
Rejection – why is nobody speaking about it? We all experience it; and it is all pervasive. Why aren’t we normalizing saying – ‘I felt rejected when you said that.’?
Pain- why is nobody saying, I am in pain because________________, and I need some down time? Doesn’t anybody need down-time? Doesn’t everybody need down time all the time? Can nobody (or everybody ) see that I need it all the time? Downtime and hugs, both. How?
Why is nobody hugging their child 24*7? Literally. Not exaggerating. What exactly is more important? Please very slowly explain to me how. Start over as many times as you need to. I will wait.
Why is nobody holding people’s hands or holding them longer than a handshake or a quick hug? Why is it weird? We all need to and want to be held. Why can’t we? It’s like we are all thirsty and parched and the only way we decide to offer water to each other is with a SPOON. A dessert spoon. And we continue to eat the cake of social media in the hope of quenching that thirst.
Why are we all so fucking stupid?
Why have we lost our brains? Does the soft grey matter really solidify and become sawdust or timber, as we grow older?
Why is nobody hurt about the fact that they’ve become the very people they promised themselves as children, that they’d never become?
Fake.
And obsessed with other people’s opinions.
And dying for approval.
Why is nobody fucking blinking?
Atleast blinking back the tears, as they look in the mirror?
Have our eyes also got coated with a glass filter, instead of tears?
Why is nobody smacking themselves on the head, or a loved one, as a reminder to live, really live, this one single, beautiful life.
Why is nobody talking about how lonely we are all feeling and to cope, drowning in Instagram and memes? Why is nobody talking about feeling un-understood? For in this feeling of isolation, we are more connected to our fellow humans, than we can ever imagine.
Why is nobody talking about the challenges of friendship? Of the making, and keeping and maintaining.
Why is nobody drinking chai, or sitting on the pot, without a phone? What is this insane discomfort with being left alone, with our head?
Why is nobody talking about a blanket ban on Instagram, on social media (for under 18s?) – as it threatens to virtually consume us? Why is nobody scared (scared, not worried) about what it will or is doing to our young? How many teenagers will have to take how many pills, or how much will they have to cut themselves, before we finally open our eyes?
Why is nobody talking about feeling dead?
Our actions are screaming it – why have our words deserted us now, like this?
What will it take?
Why is nobody crying for uprooted trees? As they just lie around fallen – after a storm? Can’t we see they died? They shaded us, oxygenated us for 40/50 years, and one fine day, a storm took them away. And we are fine? Just like that> We deserve the world we find ourselves in. No God can help or save us more than it is trying to. The ruin can be slowed, but if we insist with all our might to dig our own grave – and refuse to recognise every counter pressure, then Mubarak, it’s ours for the digging! The Creator has always been benevolent that way. Tathastu.
Why is nobody talking about the mild complexities of the friendship between men and women and having to be careful about overtones and undertones? Are we expected to wear caps that say “100% platonic” so nobody misunderstands? What about the internal hardwired prejudices about what is ‘proper’ and ‘acceptable’ and ‘decent’ ? In talks? In clothes?
When will we talk about everything that we don’t talk about?
Like sex.
That it can be beautiful, not just taboo.
About incest, all pervasive.
About abuse.
And separately, also, about the joy of intimacy.
We refuse to speak about anything and then wonder why it is all getting so complicated. Answer. Because we are not talking about it. Anything that gets talked about, improves. Anything shrouded in silence, worsens. Why is nobody talking about THIS? This should not be uncontroversial to say? We can then, obviously, do the opposite. We are masters at duplicitousness, ofcourse. But it will be a start. It will be a step. Don’t worry about the hypocrisy. We’ve reached the end of the scale on that. Feel free to do more, it won’t count.
Why is nobody preferring fancy writing instruments over fancy branded bags? Why is nobody obsessing about the quality of paper? Or the exact shade of the diary cover? Why is nobody writing on dot grids? Why is nobody filling pages this fast? Why is nobody (except _____<3) writing because they can’t seem to stop?
(Yes, I will attempt to fill all my contradictions in a single essay )
Why is nobody talking about childhood obsessions, as a way of introducing themselves and instead boring us to death with what they do for a living? Why is nobody giving us unrehearsed answers? Why is nobody refusing to give sound-bytes and calling out the wretched shallowness of them?
Why is nobody (except_____) losing sleep over the gender disparity at the workplace and doing something about it?
Why is nobody asking the lip-servicers to shut the fuck up?
Why is nobody saying that this world is structured to suit patriarchy – and that needs to end now, this minute. Not in 10 years, not in 5. Not in ‘change will come’ and not in ‘we are so much better off than earlier generations’.
Please hold my hair while I throw up.
Why is nobody saying, NOW? THIS second. Why is everybody muffled? Why is nobody screaming? I’ll smoke what they are smoking.
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Why is nobody talking about hormones wrecking our heads and hearts; sometimes our whole selves?
…And about the deep complexities and satisfactions of a devoted marriage.
…About the difficulties of overcoming your own patterns, even after you’re aware of them.
…About the difficulty of being ‘present’ and the deep joy of being present.
…About the guilt of privilege, even earned privilege (maybe because there is no such thing as ‘earned’. it’s only ‘lucked’).
Why is nobody talking about books? About ‘Thinking Fast and Slow’. And ‘Gajapati Kulpati’? About the deep deep joy that is children’s literature? Why are we not drinking more of that river? Why are we not debating replacing or atleast making it mandatory reading for adults, along with the bible and the koran and the geeta?
Why is nobody giving us one-pager guides to our life? We are all sick and tired of figuring it out and someone next to us seems to know exactly what the hell is going on and what should be done. Why is this not being leveraged?
Why is nobody wondering if the people that commit heinous crimes – especially rapes and murders – regret it later? And how they manage to live?
Why is nobody realising that making substandard art is an above standard flex?
Do people know that when you’re trying to return to yourself, there are many layers of dead skin to work through? And that you, however, cannot hack away, since there might be some live arteries going through them? And if you nick one of them, it will be a bloody mess, and you may not have the heart to start over for a while.
Why is nobody talking about the forced growth that is called ‘parenting’? The one where you are dragged kicking and screaming, while your children look on, sometimes kindly rolling their eyes, other times mildly amused, sometimes empathetic and often holding you tight?
Why is nobody saying they are tired and done? Declaring Sundays sacrosanct and announcing that only breathing and eating will be allowed.
Why is nobody talking about the joy of Friday 4pms, when the prospect of the weekend lies ahead, untarnished by the reality of it all?
Why is nobody talking about how hard it is to have a hug, a solid hug, with your spouse, if you have two kids and a dog, because everyone wants to join in this group activity?
Why is nobody talking about hug deficits being a real thing? And silence deficits too.
Why is nobody talking about anything and why is everybody just filling the air?
At some point, somewhere, maybe after around 40 loops around the sun, small talk should start embarrassing us? Why not?
Why is everybody not crying – forget helplessness, but atleast for catharsis?
Why is nobody talking about the mild and real and somewhat unfathomable distress of watching one’s parents age? Even as one sees them every week, one isn’t prepared to suddenly notice their skin is wrinkled; and in places crinkled. One then starts talking more loudly.
Why does everybody want magic, but nobody iswilling to do morning/daily pages? It’s not squats we are asking for, for God’s sake! (Though ten squats a day doesn’t seem like too much of an ask for the benefits it can deliver over nil?)
Why is nobody discarding blouses (and ideas) that no longer fit or serve them and making space for newer and more suitable ones? Have we forgotten that our clothes (and brains) are meant to serve us and not the other way around? Why are we allowing ourselves to be held ransom to, their, now unfit positions in our life? How long will we side with the tyranny of known devils? Why is everyone so scared of winning (and effectively, the unknown)? I know it’s the other way round, but do you maybe, see it better now?
I am done. I am all the nobody-s and all the everybody-s. And I am done.
I am tired.
I will wait.
I am sure someone else is going to rescue me.
I am an idiot.
(*in the first cut, I assumed and wrote that women have landed on the moon. I fell off my chair laughing when I fact-checked to find out the year, and I read that it is expected in 2024. Here – https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg26134730-100-meet-christina-koch-who-will-be-the-first-woman-to-go-to-the-moon/)
This work was written during the Ochre Sky Memoir writing workshop facilitated by Natasha Badhwar and Raju Tai.
