Dancing in the Dark: The Secret Life of An Emo Adult

There comes a moment in every woman's life when she must put her foot down and firmly state what it is she wants. A new haircut. A social life that doesn't require her to spend an upwards of two thousand rupees every weekend. Some alone time. Some non-alone time. Which really means that during the former she is trying on new eye-liner and wiping it off in her room by herself, and during the latter, her best friend is watching her do it. This in no way means that six out of ten women are not spending their alone time pondering the evolution of womankind during the ages and where, anthropologically speaking, they stand now. It just means that eye-liner may be involved a little bit.

As someone who usually doesn't feel entitled to demand stuff, I am pleased to announce that somehow life has finally hit that note for me. Ironically, what I am demanding is to be allowed to duck behind the bush of life, and wait this storm out. What storm, you might ask, and if your name is Danyal,  probably roll your eyes and spit out a heartfelt 'women!' and 'drama!' and several combinations of these two words, and I'd be happy to tell you, only I don't really know.

I think it all started a couple of weeks ago, when Yasmin walked in at work, and I said, 'Hi, you look really ni...' and started bawling, much to the horror of the collected grown up I like masquerading as. It really wasn't because I was sad, or miserable or anything synonymous with those words, it was just that, to put it super mildly, I felt like an emo 15-year-old. For the one thing, my parents suck! For another, the guy I have a crush on is very nice and I don't know what to do about it! For yet another, nobody understands all these deep feelings that reside within my heart. Did that make you want to throw up a little in your mouth? Yes? Now try imagining being the 30-year-old actually living with this unnecessary baggage of crap.

Before you judge me too much, my parents suck on a level which you will not understand till faced with questions of mortality. You never really think about these things too much, and I hope you don't, because I hope we're all too busy living to worry about kicking the bucket (there you go, my '90s child has spoken). So you spend decades thinking you have all the time in the world, to, say, ask your mom how she makes her scrambled eggs, because no one else's taste quite the same. Then one day there's just no time to ask anymore. You're all too busy just dealing with all these heavy life things, and eggs seems like a stupid thing to talk about. To reiterate an earlier emotion, I have absolutely no idea what I'm saying.

To further really mess with whatever moments of clarity I have these days, I have a massive crush on this dude. If you've read anything on this blog earlier, you know I have a freak radar. Pretty soon this intelligent, kind, talented man will turn around and ask me whether I work out, or make some interesting sartorial choices, like wearing Crocs, or completely disappear. Or, he will put on some Crocs, and as he's telling me my calves are weird, will turn around mid-conversation and disapparate. Because he's also a wizard and that's just how wizards roll.

My answer to all of this? Hide. Pretend there are no heavy things in life, and no crush dude, and all of this will pass. At the end of it all I'll be sitting by myself at a wedding and Rupert Everett will apparate out of nowhere singing something or the other. Because not only do I now live in My Best Friend's Wedding, there's been a Harry Potter crossover there too.

What I'm trying to say is, that day I went all girl on Yasmin, she told me to not worry about other people too much, as everyone's 'the hero of their own tragic story.' Here's the thing though - in my story, I don't want to exist anymore. At least for a while. Stop rolling your eyes! I know how it sounds, but I think I'm allowed this break. And maybe when I come back - maybe - all of the stuff I mentioned will have blown over. Or maybe it will be resolved, I don't know anymore. But I do know this, friends: Someday, I, yes I, will be Saturday night.

P.s. Will take a Friday too. Thursdays aren't so bad either.

Notes From Not Underground

Although I am a smartass, smart people scare me. You know the sort? They read a lot and make astute, witty observations about the world at large. Politics and film, literature and Chaz Bono. They will quote poetry, or Star Wars, and make oblique references to Nietzsche. There have been times I have understood a conversation years after it took place. Sometimes it's a wonder I have managed to stay alive as long as I have without setting fire to my own hair or something equally macabre, but not without its comic value.

I'd like to point out here that when I was 10, I borrowed a Return of the Jedi tee from my cousin and never returned it because for whatever reason, I thought it was super cool. I wonder if he remembers. It was cobalt blue, which I believe is the colour the loos in Hell are tiled in. This has nothing to do with anything.

For someone who has such an awful little to say, it should come as no surprise that my life features very few conversations, and instead of a story, this is like that Notes From Underground book which made absolutely no sense to me but was my companion on failed escapades in romance and the bathroom. So basically, I live in a sewer and am writing in a journal to be discovered after my death. Fair enough. Karachi is a sewer in the making, though a beautiful one.

I do have one long conversation a week, which is usually with Miraal, the other half of a raging bromance. My other conversation is with Yasmin, who is the loveliest girl anyone will ever meet (she knits and knows Brazilian Jiu Jitsu - I don't know the correct verb for this, okay?) and my feelings for whom are torn between girl envy and girl crush. My third most frequent converser is Danyal, whom I can't pinpoint anything about except that he has dated everyone we know. And yet he complains that his life is devoid of any romance. Why is that, Danyal? You must tell me someday.

I'm that kid at the end of the day, telling her parents, 'of course I have friends! I'm not a complete leper!' And also me, telling you that I am not that Underground weirdo. My dad had almost had a happy seizure when he saw the book though. 'First time you've bought a good book. Here's money to buy more!' I'm going to be talking a lot about this book, because I have unresolved feelings towards it. It's like, why is all important literature such a drag? or Why don't I have the intellect and perseverance to read important books? Don't answer that, I think I need brain Viagra as is.

 So I think, what we are talking about today, is the human intellect and its limitations. Why is it that some of us can watch Bee Movie with as much ease as A Clockwork Orange, as any of the Mission: Impossibe films, while the rest of us will forever put down My Best Friend's Wedding as a favourite film? It's because the guys that didn't watch Jules talk down to Kimberly for about 88 minutes were smart. No, really. That was one of the worst films I've ever seen. Who does shit like that? If you're in love with your best friend, stop making stupid pacts and just tell them you want their seven babies, or however many they can have, or give it a test run to see how things might work out. I watched it so there isn't much to be said for the choices I make except for this: I watched it while i was in my very first 'relationship' with a boy I adored but wasn't really into. When I watched My Best Friend's Wedding, I felt like I could end up like Jules at 28, alone, and in love with my best friend, who has found a very sweet 20-year-old to marry. 'I'm never breaking up with him,' I resolved, regret is a bitter pill. I did break up with him  few months on, and was very happy when he eventually got married, and not once did I put one of my blind turtles up his wife's gharara.

In case you haven't noticed, we aren't talking about the human intellect, but getting a lesson in mine.