No More A Goodie Guy

I am a heap of shortcomings, complexes and prejudices.

Been trying hard to come clean of some of them. Been a moderate success. But still there are a few, like the dreg at the bottom of a long glass.
All my life, I’ve tried to be goodie-goodie.

It’s bequeathed, I suppose, along with the lines and rows of books I grew up with.
Humility was driven hard into my sister and me by our parents right in the tender ages.

‘Be obedient and humble.’ That’s rule number one.

All our life, we have tried to live by it.

But I have run the risk of being misunderstood as weak for my meekness.
Many a time I wanted to shout out, ‘Hey, I’m not that weak, but just being meek by choice.’

But I wouldn’t do it for the fear of hurting someone.

You know, it doesn’t help. I’ve realised it after four decades of existence. You’ll just be a choco boy even in your middle age.

Life has taught me many lessons: of pain, loss, tears, joy, hardship, loneliness, rejection, failure.

I have dumped some, without actually meaning it, and without knowing even a trace of the pain it caused. I still regret it.

People have rejected me. In workplace and in personal life. I have wept alone, and wiped off the tears and smiled again.

Life…it goes on.

Okay, about my complexes. I hate it when policemen stop me, hiding at a bend, and pull me up like a criminal for not using seatbelt. The look on the constable—a triumphant smirk as if he’s picked up Sukumara Kurup (do you know who he is?)—detonates something within me.

All my efforts to be humble come a cropper at that moment.

The way he commands me to get out of the car is the trigger point. I inform him, in politeness-wrapped arrogance, that I’m at fault and would pay the fine, but officer, you must behave.

The look on the constable’s face would only aggravate the itch in my ego. I would go to the Sub-Inspector, who’d be resting his potbelly on the bulge of his jeep’s bonnet. He’d just lift his brows to look at me with disdain. I’d make sure that he sees me noticing his nameplate. I’d never call him ‘saare. I’d address him only ‘officer’. I’d say, before he could ruffle my egoistic feathers, that I’m at fault and would pay the fine, but he must behave.

Uniforms give people a notion of superiority. Even to the gatekeepers at railway crossings.

A few years ago while at the immigration of the Charles De Gaul airport in Paris a similar righteous indignation came to a boil. It was just after the 9/11, and my passport has ‘Mohammed’ as my middle name. For the young immigration officer it was a dreaded word in the wake of the Twin Tower attacks. He kept looking at my photo, scraped it with his thumb, looked back at my face, then back on the photo in the passport, then back at me, then back…doesn’t this guy look like an Egyptian?
I’m not a terrorist, Mr Officer, I said. I’m here on holidays. I have a decent newspaper job back in Dubai. But he took the passport to his superior, and this guy, a tough-looking middle-aged man, came up to me, sized me up and asked if I truly was a journalist. I nodded, and told him that every Mohammed is not a terrorist. And, told him that I’m a fiercely patriotic Indian.
I was fuming with righteous indignation.

Having said that, I need to add this bit too. Once, a friend of mine and I were at the Montreal airport on our trip to meet the World Anti-Doping Agency officials. I had my fears of being frisked in public, and had put on my best-looking brief. But this officer took a good look at my passport, me, smiled, thundered down a stamp on my passport and returned it. All within five minutes.

Next was my friend, a Christian. He had this air of confidence about him since only those having Muslim names would be embarrassed, and that too in the American continent. He flicked across his passport, and stood there smiling with a don’t-you-know-I-am-Christian look on him. Man, he didn’t know what he was in for. The officer, I still don’t know why, dismantled him and assembled again—a neat overhaul. He hair-split each page of his passport and surveyed his photograph under microscope. By this time, my angelic, holy friend had become demonic and in the verge of tears!

Uniforms rub me on the wrong, I reckon.

Now back to what I was saying. To friends and relatives, I am so sweet. But to be frank, I am deceptive. How I want to tell them what I feel like? To be honest. To call a spade a spade, and have a conscience as clean as a whistle.

But I gulp down words, and bottle up my true feelings. I know, even though ‘no’ is a difficult answer, most of the time it would be the right one. I must learn to say ‘no’. But it is tough, mate.

Someone very dear to my heart is quite the opposite. She would speak out her mind. And, that’s it. No more grudge or gnashing of teeth or kicking the walls. She said she’s learnt it over the years. And, finds people love her for that.

But I, on the other hand, smile and swallow what I feel and say something sweet.
And, I groan in angst and anguish. I crib. I murmur. I water and nurture a poison tree in my heart. I watch it grow tall and its roots go deep.

I’ve realised that I am deceptive—to my friends and dear ones.

The other day I sat down and thought to find out why I do this. There are two reasons. One, of hurting the other person and subsequently losing him or her. Two, of painting myself in a bad picture.

Both are just fears. Lies that keep me submissive and timid.
But I have taken a couple of decades to realise that those who love me will still love me for being what I am.

We keep growing up, don’t we?

(Published in Yentha.com)