Tag: life

  • Forget Me Not (You Already Have)

    Each year, happy mourners lay summer to rest, its body entombed in burning soil, and plan for colder months. How do we forget, year after year, that the sky packs its bags every winter? The smog hides us from the eyes of God and the arms of the sun. And it makes us forget. →

  • Bye Bye Birdie

    Now that I have no way of actually speaking to you, let me speak to you. Let me talk to you for a little while. Why don’t you make yourself a cup of coffee – even though it makes you sick – and settle in. This might take a bit of time. →

  • “Another Story I Can’t Tell Anymore”

    Everyone feels this, and everyone pretends they didn’t. For a split second, life stops. I see you, you see me; we take in each other: eyelashes, sunshine like crystal shattered in our eyes, frozen dust motes suspended in the air around us. →

  • London and I: A Tragedy (1/3)

    I collapsed while standing and couldn’t get out of bed for 3 days straight. My throat kept constricting, I couldn’t eat, and I threw up record amounts of pasty grey phlegm. There I was, utterly alone in my springy double bed, sedated with heavy painkillers, drifting in and out of miserable sleep at odd hours… →

  • Lover Song

    But here’s what I wonder: why must you teach me sharp lessons? I thought love was like falling into each other softly, not smashing headfirst into steely concrete and splitting heads open. We’re bleeding all over the pavement, don’t you see? →

  • On First Love

    When I think of first love, I don’t think of him. I don’t think about the soft bridge of his nose, or the way his eyes slanted away from each other in small, sloppy angles that I could only see if I was close enough. I don’t remember the contours of his face, or the… →

  • Super Brown Girls, You Have No Future

    Aunties don’t like our butts, they don’t like our boobs, and they don’t like our blemishes. A well endowed girl is vulgar, a well made up one is a slut, and tanned girls have no marriageable prospects. →

  • “Let’s Break Up Today!” or you know, How To Not Do That

    Dating tips invariably end with warnings that say: “He/she doesn’t have to be the one!”, “Just have fun while you’re in it!”, “Don’t date someone who lives close by, because when it ends, it’ll be much harder to get over!”, “If they hold you back, leave them immediately!” and more and more. Stupid, stupid. →

  • Five Reasons To Fall In Love With Christmas (Again)

    I love Christmas. I’m a 20 year old, Pakistani Muslim girl, and I love celebrating Christmas, just like I’ve always done. What I don’t understand is why it has to be about religion. I’ll tell you some ofwhat Christmas means to me: The Tree… Who doesn’t like Christmas trees? I grew up decorating weathered evergreens with… →

  • These Are The Things I’ve Learnt

    There may be a boy who inspires you to be better, and once that happens, you may leave. There may be a girl who you adore from the delicate nape of her neck to her pink painted toes. And those may be the only things you love about her. Love is love. →

  • As A College Student In The Real World…

    Being in college is being in the real world.  A professor offered this nugget in class today.  And even though I don’t own real estate, a manicured lawn or a squall of mewling offspring, I feel like a real person. Living the real life. Doing real things. I mean, where else but college would you have… →

  • About The Woman Who Raised Me

    The woman who raised me is not my mother. The woman who raised me is not a mother.   This woman has a tiny heart, and a smaller spirit. I have learned this the hard way.   She was always too busy to read me bedtime stories but never too occupied to later point out… →

  • How To Be Proud Of Your Thin Skin

    I have a new mantra for you.  Over-feeling is not a bad thing. Going through the world with your heart on your sleeve is not a bad thing. Feeling others’ pain as you would your own is not a bad thing. Taking things to heart and hurting is not a bad thing. There are people who will… →

  • How Mr. Darcy Proposed Under Meg’s Umbrella In Hogwarts

    I bought an umbrella from China. A frilly edged, white and pink parasol with a neat wooden handle, glossy and polished. Walking to class in the morning with the sun trying to burn my skin, I had a sudden vision of Meg going to the Gardiners’ house for the weekend, and deploring the umbrella Mrs. March gets… →

  • Where’s Daddy?

    “Class consciousness.” Never been truer than for the middle classes. Now I grew up in nine different houses. Sometimes I got to put candy in the grocery cart, and sometimes not. There were vacations some summers, and some summers were spent under a lazy ceiling fan at home. I didn’t grow up with the security… →

  • My Father, The Mortal

    Today, my life changed. Well, not in the shooting stars or melodramatic turn of events way; rather in a stop and think kind of way. Today, I realized my dad isn’t immortal after all. Sure, he’s the hero I’ve always looked up to, the staunch defender of his castle, the infallible, strong male presence I’ve come to… →

  • My “X” and I…Or Why Equations And I Don’t Get Along

    (Read the whole thing. I promise, it’s worth it.) Why, I ask, must you have equations? Isn’t it bad enough that there exist letters in a subject, which should only have numbers? I mean, a and b belong to the alphabet; they are numerals of the English Language, not of something that has plus and… →

  • Lean On Me, Fall On Me, Laugh With Me…

    There’s a kind of love that I’ve heard about. There’s a girl who’s kept a wedding scrapbook since the age of 10, with bits of lace and newspaper articles talking about your perfect day! When she meets the boy she is meant to, her mind will swim with thoughts of wining, dining, and a lot of sweeping-off-of-feet.… →

  • I Built A House Of Grape Vines And Sunshine

    Today was a good day. It was one of those days when the sun poured liquid gold and painted the tops of buildings yellow. I sat outside my room watching how sunshine streamed through leaves, making them transparent, almost. And it reminded me of the days I used to spend at my aunt’s house. I… →

  • Take Me To A Deserted Island…

    If you were stranded on a desert island, whom would you want standing by your side? Calculating the value of people is simple; just put two perspectives. Walking in to a room with sunshine in your hair and brilliance in your smile is easy. Anyone, and I mean anyone can fake a smile. I’ve met… →