Recently, when i told someone that i was scared, they unanimously said that it was me trying to play with their emotions. I always wanted to be the victim in the story and therefore assigned myself the role of the scared, helpless woman in every situation i was in, in their opinion. And yet, the fear was real. Palpable. Amidst all the theories that people threw around me, it was in the air and i was always in the look out for a safe place.
Session after session, in therapy, i tried to find out what it was that scared me because the last time i told someone i was scared, that's what they wanted to know. 'What is it that you are scared of?' They'd asked me repeatedly - which made me even more scared. I pay - my poor sponsor does - Rs. 2000 for a session to find answers to such questions that people so casually spring on me. 'Hey, did it rain yesterday, in Calicut?' 'You got a haircut?' 'What's your fear?'. Hold on, give me Rs. 2000. I'll try and find out?
But today, i drew my fear. It was a boulder. A large one, with a stick in its hand. A lopsided mouth, shouting unintelligible sounds. Grey, like a rock. I joked about it after drawing it, saying how it was a classic phallic symbol. My therapist asked me what associations i had of my phallic symbol boulder shaped fear.
Two came to my mind, even as i drew it. One, from when the familiar scenario of me being beaten by mother for various reasons. I would hide under the cot when it got unbearable. Even as a child, i always felt that she never looked under there because she too, was tired of beating. I only ever felt compassion for her, even when i knew that my fear boulder had the lopsided mouth because she imitated me, making ugly shapes with her mouth, producing sounds that were supposedly how i talked and cried, but sounded so gross, it made me feel like shit.
The second one was that in a hotel room, it was not going well with that man. I had to get out of there. But you know what? Men are physically stronger than women. Science. A man my age and weight will be stronger than my physically. Reason why we have male - female criteria in sports for the same events. Different rules. Anyway, this man was more than double my age. He was strong. I unbolted the door and was about to flee. But he just swept in from nowhere and ever so casually put his foot at the door and that was it. I couldn't open it. However hard i tried, it wouldn't budge. And all he had to do was put his damn foot at the door. Effortless gesture. Lots of time to further beat me up, rape, if he felt like it, verbally abuse. A foot got him all that.
This was what it felt like. I was confined to spaces i didn't want to be in. Under the cot. In a pathetic hotel room. While i only felt compassion for mother, for the man and his foot, i felt pure rage. '
I was cornered. There was no help in sight and pretty soon, i would be able to hear the fear boulder spew out its opinions about me. It could be 'you sleep with older men because you like seasoned dicks' or 'all you are interested in class is how the asses of the boys sway' or, more recently, like i said, 'all you ever want to be is a helpless victim and that's why you say you are scared.' I didn't want to be under the cot or in the hotel room listening to these theories but you know, the foot.
The thing however, is that now, i am out of it. I always come out of it. The most recent episode took around two months, i suppose. It lingered till i sent a one liner mail saying what i wanted to say. Till then, i was under the cot. The others took years. But, i just want to tell everyone that you will always find a way out of under the cot, out of the stupid hotel room - if you work hard. If you are not able to get out of there, it only means that your two months or five years haven't passed. But the good thing about time is - like the bad thing about physiology is that men are stronger than women - that it can only pass. You can only grow older. The only people who are happy about aging, friends, are us, because it just takes us closer to our way out of under the cot.
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