Books, lovers, perspectives

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies . . . The man who never reads lives only one.
– George R. R. Martin, American novelist and short-story writer

Today I have two short stories within one column. They both have given me perspectives of life – and so I shall introduce both of them to you. The first, books, were my building blocks to what I could expect from life and to walk the world, unbowed and unbent from family pressures because I knew there was much more than what they told me from their myopic world view. The second, lovers, mirrored my darkest agonies and my deepest longings and thought me that both are the smoke and ashes of expectations, and what was real was me, and that true love does exist for everyone.

I was saved by books.

Saved from a life of mediocrity, of submission to the status quo, of subscribing to what my parents knew and society around me expected of me.

Escaping into books from the age of 6, they became my friend, ally, weapon, mentor and the source of great adventures, whispering always ‘no, don’t believe them. There is more to life than this’. They made me want much more than the provincial life I was born into. They taught me to think beyond what my culture, religion, country and society told me to think.

It made me long to be larger than life. To live. To taste. To desire. To want. To free my mind and dive into the great infinity of possibilities and beyond.

Books made me Legion. I lived many lives through many centuries and looked at life from many eyes and felt from many hearts. I learnt to love, laugh, feel, cry and sigh far far away from the maddening ordinariness of my simple life.

I became extraordinary. I gleaned wisdom from the greatest minds, I fell in love with the most romantic souls, I died a thousand deaths and soared on a thousand triumphs. I lived beyond me.

Clothed by a thousand fables, and knowledge that slipped through the eternal pathways of time, I walked into rooms of mere mortals like a strident princess. Waiting out the mundane of the day – for life began when I would go home and be transported into the cosmos again and be part of the universe.

Books were my magic wand. My superhero power. My crutch. My connection to the world.

They were and always will be the great empowerer and enabler.

Lovers through, I had to live with, not just a one-sided take as I could with books. You learn a lot with lovers, you get plenty of perspectives but things get messy, because you cannot walk away from them like you could a bad book. Well, you can but it’s not as easy.

There are three types of lovers we would all have experienced in our lives.

Our first love at our formative years. It’s heady and exciting and we fall headlong into it, but we grow apart or end it over some trivial argument because the relationship was superficial to begin with, not the deep, raw love that you’ll experience later on. The heartbreak can feel immense, initially, but we recover quickly and learn that things aren’t always like they appear to be in the movies.

The second love is the intense love that turns our world upside down. The relationship becomes a mirror into our soul: we see all our insecurities, our needs, and our desires staring back at us. We experience anguish, self-doubt, jealousy and fear, with massive highs and dramatic lows. Expectations are high and we try to change our other half into our version of a perfect partner, and we try to mould ourselves to become theirs. It’s a rollercoaster ride that leaves us feeling guarded, distrusting, and hurt. The heartbreak from this relationship is indescribably painful, but it makes us grow, change, evolve and find inner strength and resilience. We discover our true self, cultivate self-love and know exactly what we do and don’t want from love.