By “Single and I know it! *rolls eyes*
Oh, feels like it’s been this way forever.
You know, I just personalized the famous song “Sexy and I know it” and also tuned into it on my phone as I begin to write. This piece can’t be written without good music in the background for two reasons – one, it’s not very pleasing to think about douchebags and, even worse, to write about them and two, person like me deserves good vibes for being hopeless optimistic.
And, yes! Now, we’re on for the hottest topic of my life, not just for me but for anyone who has ever met or known me in India with a none-of-their-business concern and wondered, “lagti toh theek hai! Sundar bhi hai…phir pata nahi kyun..” (Looks like a good girl with good looks, wonder why she hasn’t got a life partner as yet.)
Ok, guys. Let me make a confession here. I have always been very old school kind of a person who believes in love, relationships, togetherness and forever. I really do. I mean, Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge has been like a holy movie guide to perfect love and happy-ever-after for me ever since I watched it and yes, it is the only movie I have watched the maximum number of times ever.
Somehow, it never has been in my destiny to meet the ‘Raj‘ of my dreams till now – someone I can look up to, learn from, be driven in life, get smitten by, apart from the basic checklist of he being totally head over heels on me, something like cracking a jackpot (this is so on point with no exaggeration), lovable, truthful, open-minded, forward-looking with a strong character. (See, am being so considerate to not write his earning range and background like one of those shaadi portals he he.)
I have rejected many and many a times, I’ve been rejected. I am being harsh on myself here but it’s okay, I don’t have any better word to describe the buffet of reasoning that men have given me. And you know, rejection has an unsaid rule – it carries the capacity to change lives only when taken unexpected.
Rejections began in my life as early as in teens and by the end of school life. If ‘rejection’ was a person, I’d hug it tight and thank from the bottom of my heart because those, who I thought were worthy of me, were actually weren’t worthy of even a second look.
For my followers who always wanted to know and those of you who’ve been intrigued about my relationship status, the end to your curiosity begins now – why else you think am writing this piece. *flutters eyes*
I explained to you in my previous #BornToBelieve blogs about my childhood and mannerisms. I wasn’t a girly, delicate, feather-weighted lass loaded with cuteness and sexiness but I was more of daring damsel with ready-to-take-on-world attitude. I could be described as a “tomboy”, a popular word back then.
Girls being called as “bold, tomboy” on their unexpectedly different attitude to “opinionated and strong-headed” in this era is a massive shift. But has the expectations of boys and men changed accordingly? I am not sure. From my experience, men, mostly, still get intimidated by women who call the shots for themselves.
It wasn’t any different back then. Here’s a deep dive in my past and the kind of boys and men I have come across in my life till now and by the end of the article you’ll know the choices life threw at me and the choices I threw back at life and asked my well-deserved right to not settle for mediocre and keep alive the quest for the best. And, it is unbelievable how life rewarded me in “rejections” and gave its timely affirmations to my stance.
Boys At School
Boys will be boys, they say. And, I think they say that for a very good reason. Boys in school like girls who are feminine, cute and mostly, easily attracted to the ones who wear a submissive smile and short skirt. This is the age of continuous confusion for both girls and boys. They talk about love but, that’s because they can’t dare to ask for anything else. (of course, this isn’t true for childhood sweethearts who go on to marry.)
I was never attracted to the boys of my school, rather, I was always on a different tangent all together. I didn’t feel any lesser than them in the playground and classroom alike. I don’t think any boy dared to even joke around with me (unless a friend) barring the times I played cricket with them. For me, it was more about powerplay than playing around with them.
I was never like those girls who wanted a guy around them to feel secure and girly. I always had guy buddies and believed in friendship. I never had a relationship in school for three reasons, primarily, I am guessing – no one ever and I mean ever, proposed to me because of my “tomboy” personality, they didn’t have guts to approach and were intimidated by me. I can say the last two with conviction, actually, because some boys (now, men) shared it with me later in life and my reaction to that was, “Woa! I never knew!”
No, seriously. I had zero interest in boys, affairs and wasting time to hang out, sneak out and similar stuff. I was always focussed on the cultural activities and studies, though, the prior one took away the major portion of it and I had to put in extra for the latter to survive.
I waited to receive one rose on ‘Rose Day’ during the entire high school life and I can’t recall of a petal that came my way. As much as I remember, I crushed on only two boys – one was three years senior and the other one, a year elder. I spoke with the first one several times on phone and days later, he apologized to me and said there wasn’t anything serious and it was just for the heck of it. The other one never knew about my crush on him.
When I look at both of them today, I thank my stars for saving me because I can’t even begin to imagine myself standing next to them, forget about being in a relationship. From their lifestyle to career choices, I don’t think I would have ever fit in.
If you believe in destiny, start believing in it further more because it does know more than you, sometimes.
Boys At Colony
Colony boys elder to girls were all bhaiyas (brothers) by default. Some were girl friends’ brothers so, they automatically became bhaiyas while some were forced in as bhaiyas by their mothers and some were, well, actually, bhaiyas only.
But, I have a different complicated bhaiya story.
Confusion and vulnerability are a teenager’s worst and best companion. “Worst” for obvious reasons and I call them “best” because those situations stay for the rest of our lives. Nothing stays like a teen lesson.
I was an honest girl who was naïve and unsure of her feelings at a time when I had no guide or a wise friend. I liked a boy who wasn’t of my age and thus, the understanding of that ‘liking’ was limited to the bhaiya feeling. It was the first time I was discovering a strong emotion for the opposite gender.
I used to share my feelings and secrets with him and since I had mentioned of my despair of not having a real brother or a sister – he had offered me to become my Rakhi brother and I accepted. Our colony friends used to mock us and say, “Are you really brother and sister?”
Soon, his mother started to trouble me and my mother over my close proximity with him. She couldn’t stand the fact that I shared a bond with her son and went full throttle after a teen girl to keep her at bay. She called up my mother at her house once and tried to humiliate her by sharing analogies of “bad girls” and some really creative shit that I don’t remember anymore. And, since I was a just a girl with no power and say, madly drenched in the emotions of purest form, I did not know what to do. If I offended her, she would have never allowed me to talk to her son. My mother faced it all for me and eventually started to put restrictions on me – something unnatural to her as she was always someone who gave me freedom to be. Now when I look back, I can easily go down to that woman’s level but I have already risen up to my own from where humans like her appear as small as their characters.
My answer to that woman and every other down-market human being who finds cheap thrill in indulgence in others’ business and lives to heckle, lies in my success today.
For the times my mother sat at places and listened to the disgusting moral police and shameless opinions for me, I compensated it with making her sit at a place where India’s top personalities, Bollywood celebrities, names to reckon with, came and I hosted them at an international stage.
Boys At College
Boys at my college weren’t that great either. The only time I had a crush on a guy was my first and last regret of my college life.
He was such a lame ass that I can’t even begin to explain his stupid dumbfuckness. Apparently, he liked me and we used to talk on phone and made plans to hang out. After few days or weeks may be, during a Table Tennis session in our college basement, he confessed to me that he likes my friend more than me and he started speaking to me so that he could have a chance on her. I didn’t know whether to get angry or amused but as much as I remember, it did get on my nerve.
Fast forward to my Zumba days. Once I was taking a shadow class at a fitness club chain in Gurgaon and there I saw him entering my class, with his paunch and wife. Despite he belonging to a well-off business background, I bowed down to my stars again because I knew what I had been saved from.
There was another guy in my college who liked me and tried to speak to me about it in our canteen but I spoiled it for him by talking about my crush on the guy mentioned above, before he could confess.
These were my only two boy-stories from the college. Thinking about the kind of girl I have always been, I think I could settle with only one story but can I ever be thankful enough that I wasn’t chosen for the paunch that came with easy family money.
Men At Work
Honestly, I wasn’t out there with a plan to meet good men at work and thus, I wasn’t disappointed because the quality here, too, was as dismal as it could be.
I mean, wherever my eyes could see, I mostly saw mediocrity aplenty. I don’t think I ever met someone I was really attracted to and wanted to be with. Usually, one tends to think of media industry as a place where there is class and glamour. I beg to differ. I have only come across men here as those who are either saving their asses, drooling over them or licking their boss’.
Of all the places I worked, I can’t believe that the only time I fell for someone, was at my dream job and found out that I was such a fool to share my honest, heartfelt feelings for someone so unworthy of them and above all, an overgrown kid. I didn’t have a relationship with this man child because he, despite knowing my feelings and reciprocating to them, always used to keep me at the edge. That is, because he never wanted me. Apart from doing justice to my introspection and going all guns for my dreams, one of the reasons I quit my job was also to get rid of him.
If you’re reading it today, thank you for not wanting me and letting my life prosper. Look, the heartbreak, that which your kind of character may never know of or accept of giving, took me places.
Men From Mars
The popular book ‘Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus’ explains the characteristics of men, women and how their mannerisms differ in different situations.
Yes, men think and feel differently but behaviour is always a choice.
My second relationship was with a person who hailed from a small town and had come to Delhi to make it big. He was a decent, committed, sensitive boy who wasn’t flamboyant like me yet he made real efforts to like me because he had fallen for me. I, too, used to try and understand his perceptions but eventually we realized the differences of characters and opinions and that we weren’t meant to be.
Ironically, I didn’t have a heartbreak for a nice person like him and I think, this was the only time I didn’t have one and moved on while it took him a while to come to terms with the development. It hurt him more as I was his first girl.
He, definitely, could be categorized as someone “from Mars”. He had a different personality than mine. His way of living and doing things differed but he knew the essence of love, togetherness and was certainly not a douchebag. He was a boy of ethics back then and am sure, he has turned out to be a man of strong character by now. He’s the only person I have chosen to be in touch with.
Men From Nowhere
‘Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus”, largely, compares the characteristics of men, women, how they sport different sides, moods and what their actions mean or signify.
However, men are not always just “from Mars”.
‘Non-compatibility’ is a behavioural attribute while ‘characterlessness’ doesn’t qualify as a personality trait. Whether of a man or woman, ‘characterlessness’ is unethical and sure-shot destructive.
My first relationship and love was for a person I met on the internet during my college days. He was elder to me and was an a-grade, experienced asshole and liar! (taking a pause as my eyes get wet…) I was in a relationship with him for three years – out of which 18 months saw me staying back after knowing his reality and how much of an asshole a man can be.
My first love was a total disaster. It could have destroyed me. It was a mess I had to go through unwillingly and willingly because of my stupid simplicity of thinking to be in “true love” and being all for it, even if that meant destruction for self and those around me.
As I neared the end of these horrendous three years, I was already in the ditch of depression. With the help of my brother, I decided to end this chapter and begin a new life by learning Reiki and healing myself out of it.
Two years later, as I moved on, I started liking a guy, an athlete who I met for a formal interaction as I covered sports beat that time. He was an international sportsperson who beamed with pride to have nailed one of the “fastest man in India” titles.
At the onset, he stood up to that title and chased me. Then he made sure I chased him. The thrill a male derives from such a lowly act could not only be termed as cheap but also something only namards (unreal men) are capable of.
We weren’t in a relationship, of course, for a simple reason that such men avoid proposing to girls because they want it easy and to be a no-strings-attached set up. They’d leave the girl guessing because attention is all they want and can achieve the extreme of lameness to get it.
Eventually, he turned out to be a liar too who was just out there having fun, clueless about his unaccountable actions and a douchebag who was enjoying living a characterless life.
Cut to 2020, 11 years later, I saw him on a dating app while mostly thumbing the cross mark on the hopeless buffet of profiles. His profile mentioned fake age and profession, expectedly. I wish I could share that screenshot with you but I will just settle with my conviction – once an asshole, always an asshole!
And, so was this guy who thought of me as a casual chic just because he spoke to me through a dating app and as per his understanding, those who are on dating apps are not serious. He was no better than any other guy on mobile, finding a girl to hook up with. A well-off pilot or so it seemed – what a waste of a much-celebrated profession and gender in India.
My third and last relationship had become official. Well, almost. I met this person on a marriage portal and liked him for his open-mindedness and accepting me the way I am.
One month into the relation, he was keen to meet my parents and take it forward. I made him meet my parents and they liked him (wasn’t a surprise because all they’ve ever wanted is that I choose, something they know won’t happen easily!)
We all have a past and how truly we share about them with our partners is all that matters. We all have this unsaid urge to be accepted with our past and seek a partner who’d love us unconditionally. To have it hidden and lie, is to call for a destined end one day or the other.
As he planned to break this news to his parents, I saw some of his mails that put him in the spotlight of a questionable past and another side of him while he was with his parents.
After an altercation, I decided to accept him unconditionally. But, it was only a matter of months that I saw him change because of his inclination towards his parents and when it was about them, he didn’t appear to be himself. It wasn’t a good sign. A man who isn’t able to balance it out will never go far in a relationship.
Time transformed him, rather, showed his true character. As he began to tour outside India, the level of communication declined because he changed. He started throwing up excuses and wasn’t interested to dedicate himself towards the relation. I decided to dump him because I knew I deserved a better person, lover and most importantly, a genuine human-man soul. He has come back twice after that. Not that I allowed him, but still he has shown his truest lame self and level.
And this one is the last on the list.
I met this seemingly nice man at an event. He drove me back in my car, asked for my number and we started talking. As I started to like him, I found out that he was lying to me about his whereabouts. I stopped talking but he continued to wish me on festivals and a year later, I decided to speak to him again because I came to terms with the fact that his lie was harmless.
Days passed and he came across as stuck. He wasn’t going to commit to me because of the past that he held close to his chest. I walked out of what was not even a relationship and was never stopped. A year later, I again spoke to him without any pre-determined thought but all this while I happened to have more-than-a-friend feelings for him, of course. He, too, appeared to be on the same lines but as his reality struck me hard, am not sure if he ever was for real.
One day, my saviour universe decided to cut this back-and-forth crap and orchestrated a moment that revealed his closely-held past. All hell broke loose and out came a straight-face statement, “No, am not a liar and cheater…I’d have shared when the right time came…” I still crawled towards positivity and decided to go with the flow but the trust, with which my conscience breathed, was brutally smashed.
Make no mistake – a man, who lies and hides about his personal life, is the biggest scumbag, a fraud who has walked this earth and that “right time” is a big fat lie!
From thinking that am someone who’s into betting to recording him to blackmail or probably, a money extortionist, this person crossed every level of basic human decency just to save his ass. A supposed Managing Director of a startup – big shame.
*sigh*
I think this is the last time I ever want to go back and write about such people. May be, I could write their names too but then I realized they definitely don’t deserve to be known for nothing. It was and is always about my life and ordeals.
And, as I’ve allowed only numbered men to enter my life, it was befitting in a way to just number them as one, two and three. Rest, don’t even deserve a number in my eyes.
Where are the Raj Malhotras of the world now? Is romance dead? We’re fast changing to a world where love and commitment are becoming “uncool”. Just for the record, human souls are built with universal virtues like truth, love and there are in no way getting out of mind like a quick viral video or obsolete like an outdated app version. You have to continuously upgrade yourself to love and be truthful.
Men from nowhere are going nowhere in life. Take my word for it. And, karma is getting them. One day.
By now you could think that these words are coming from someone who appear to be a self-righteous, self-anointed critic who’s taking all this space for an easy self-pity.
To that, I just have to say – these words are coming from the honesty with which I have always tried to be true to men in my life. And, I can walk on fire to prove it if I had to. But, why will I? (taking a pause here to process the emotions…)
I don’t think my forever guy will ever put me through these emotions again for a real man knows how to keep his woman.
“Imagine what will happen if everything we wish for starts coming true…” said my brother, once. I’m just grateful to God for not giving me what I wanted. Small injuries are always better than a major accident.
My immense gratitude to God comes from the belief that he always left me on my own till a point where I was making the wrong choice and pulled me back close as soon as he saw me on the verge of falling into the pit of endless darkness sans exit.
“I am not your prince charming… this is not a movie…” I think I waited to hear it to turn my belief even stronger. Life is surely not a movie but movies inspire lives. Of course, realism remains but nobody can stop anyone to imagine love and life so ideal that it feels like a movie. For if you won’t imagine for yourself, no one else will.
I am just walking on the path of belief that there’s definitely someone with integrity, truth and love out there, waiting for me, like I’ve been waiting for him with patience beyond words now. There’s a difference between being ‘single and available’ and ‘single and not available’. It’s a choice only an uncompromising soul can make.
Marriage is a different ball game all together. It is like making a team of two like-minded persons and I cannot get into it randomly just because it was or is the “right time”. Mediocre unsettles me.
And, it makes me wonder why there has always been a need for this world to call love in its real sense as ‘true love’.
‘True love’ is just an oxymoron. Love has to be true only and in its purest form and meaning, means ‘truth’.
Just waiting for the day when my favourite Jennifer Lopez’ song ‘First Love’ will make sense like never before.
(plays in the background…:))
“I knew I had to leave the world behind me… to find out who I was. I knew that love will never search for me. I had to search for it. And, I knew you were out there. I knew that if I went far enough and left everything behind, I will find you.”
I am sure my man will have one in his head too. With baited breath I wait when I will palat palat palat… (turn back DDLJ style).
And, that day is not very far.
What do you think?