3. FLOAT LIKE A BUTTERFLY…

A song to fill your ears whilst reading - Promise - Ben Howard

A letter to You:
I drove down that familiar road today and it made me think of you. That road and everything surrounding it rushed past me like our memories. The street I’d turn in to that led me to your house, it passed me. That street I’d drive down after sneaking out of my home in the weary hours of the night, it passed me. The cemetery where we visited your mother, it passed me. I paused, because those memories didn’t, they spilled back in front of me. That day you asked me to join you because it was her birthday. You led me to her grave, rigid. Then, you sank into my arms and I cried with you. As you leaned in closer to me, your familiar cologne would fill my senses. As always, that fragrance made me float. It was raining that day. I wore my sister’s white sneakers without her knowledge. They were pasted with wet mud by the evening. She would later yell at me. But nonetheless, it was a day filled with so many ‘small moments like this’ (a quote I wrote with your voice in my head). I have to keep rewinding however. Back to where it all began. To the person I used to be, but a person who still carries the same heart. The one that can never hate you. Because no matter what, there are some hearts that won’t ever hate a person, no matter how much they hurt you…

My first love story.  A complicated one to say the least.  I’ve thought about how to bring this story to life.  Slouched on my bed, ears plugged, music making me drift, eyes watery, wearing invisible virtual reality goggles, watching these memories.  Watching how vulnerable I was, how so in love I was, how by the end of it, I couldn’t recognise the person looking back at me in my own mirror. I have started and deleted numerous beginnings.  Because I’ve invited you into my realm and exposed my night sky.  But I guess I want “to begin my life with the beginning of my life”, an ode to David Copperfield.  I want you to grasp more elements of who I am, or who I was growing up to fully understand me, my journey and how this part of my life makes sense.  Because this is a love story yes, but more importantly it’s a story of a girl’s metamorphosis, of her eventually venturing into life as an embodiment of a floating butterfly.

Who was I? I was someone who always toyed with my identity growing up in a Lebanese family in Australia.  I constantly had one culture thrown at me whilst trying to fit into another.  In a way this mirrored my parents who were migrants trying to find their place in a society, trying to assimilate to a culture that rejected them.  They arrived to Australia in the 70s as foreigners, escaping a civil war in their mother country eventually building a life for themselves, however it was amidst constant racism and discrimination.  I guess this made my parents’ resilience even more tough, they didn’t give up and this really shone through the family with my sisters and I growing up with this hard work and problem solving mentality.

I was the youngest of 5 girls so I was intentionally in the shadow of my 4 sisters throughout my childhood up until my late teens.  This already had my shy and timid nature brewing.  What added to this was what our culture expected of females, a woman who is mhazbeh.  Translated to English, this means ‘proper’, being a ‘good girl’ in the traditional sense.  Being an educated, polite and respectful girl.  Not speaking out of line.  No dating.  No boys.  Maybe this cocooned my true self in a way.  Don’t get me wrong, there are so many beautiful things about our culture, but I guess like everything, there are pros and cons.  The worst being these elements and how Lebanese families traditionally were all about upholding a ‘good’ reputation and putting on this show of perfectionism.  What a melancholic venture one pursues as they attempt to find this ‘treasure’ called perfectionism.  Guarded by an invisible dragon, breathing fire at you as you eventually defeat it only to realise it never existed in the first place.  It was an invisible treasure, a deceptive thought.  Yet, I fell into the trap of trying to reach it.  In the end, I didn’t really know who I was or what my opinions were.  Mostly caring about how people viewed me and seeking their approval, especially my father's.  A man of little words, a father who was emotionally absent.  The one person I couldn’t communicate with.  Moving around the house in separate directions, muttering a ‘hello’ every so often.  For someone like me who is usually able to reel information out of people, he stopped me in my tracks.  Yet, it was his opinion that I sometimes cared about most, maybe because he provided me with next to no reassurance.  Despite his inability to speak to me or my sisters for that matter, my father’s opinions and expectations were quite evident surrounding our paths and futures.  On the other hand, my mother had her moments of conservatism and conveyed what you would picture a stereotypical housewife to be but she eventually wanted a different life for her daughters. Despite her over-protectiveness, my mother was definitely the one who was a lot more open-minded, understanding our visions for our lives.   It’s a funny thing the way my sister’s and I eventually transpired.  From what is expected of women in our culture and what my father envisioned for us, we chose the complete opposite path in the end. It’s a difficult outcome to reach sometimes though but one that’s definitely important: you will not flourish living out someone elses expectations of your life. It’s important to grasp this power that is yours.  I mention my sisters here numerous times, but this small paragraph does not do justice for the inspiration they have been for me throughout my life.  A more detailed post will be written soon about these brilliant women I treasure most. 

So, what did it look like living in Australia then? Well, I never seemed to fit in. Especially in school, I was a square peg in a round hole. It’s a strange thing to be confined in a home with these different ideals versus being exposed to a western culture that was the complete opposite. A culture that was a lot more easy going and non-nonchalant about certain things. Academics were strongly enforced on to us whereas in a typical high school experience, the majority mixed their studies with a social life of some sort. High school parties, having a boyfriend/girlfriend, friends, kissing, sex, alcohol, all this among other things. Well friends, I had a couple but really, my sisters were my best friends. Parties? I was too awkward for those but also, I wasn’t really allowed to go to them. Boys? Well, that was a topic that was completely taboo in our household. As a result, I endured intense social anxiety when any boy would speak to me. To add to the tremendous cultural differences, I experienced intense bullying from some disloyal friends in addition to racism and bigotry. ‘Terrorist’ they would say.  ‘Where are you really from?’, a common question and one I loathed. I was the girl with the weird name which no one could pronounce. My lunch was always a target as well; I remember my sister telling me once that she threw out her lunch to avoid these situations. I hated my culture for all of these reasons because I always felt like I didn’t belong here. As a result, I tried my utmost to suppress my heritage. Already being extremely timid, high school made my self confidence diminish even more by the minute. This discrimination, I didn’t realise, was setting me up for failure and insecurity in other moments of my life. So I guess a mixture of being racially vilified in high school and the somewhat conservative nature of my Lebanese culture created a barrier throughout my life. 

After graduating from school, I spent the following 3 years writing scripts, fictional stories, directing my first short film at university. Writing, filmmaking, story-telling - maybe in a way, art would invite me into worlds I was more comfortable in. It allowed me to drift, travel into the depths of my mind and be left with a cascade of thoughts on paper. My original reality started to become a worthy competitor however, when I landed my first job in a phone store whilst balancing university life. It was during this time that I was forced to stand on my own two feet. I was accustomed to hiding myself but here I had to learn a sense of confidence to sell products to strangers. Not only did this make me extremely apprehensive but so did having to meet my fellow colleagues. I was generally quite a recluse - my sisters were my comfort zone as I always found it difficult meeting new people. How wrong I was though. Because it was then that I finally met friends I resonated with but also, who helped me see life from a different perspective. They started to open up a new world for me and most importantly, they restored my faith in people. Before this, I always felt like I didn’t have much to offer. I would eventually create some of the greatest memories with these friends: my first nights out clubbing, nights in, late night conversations in someone’s car that revealed some deep thoughts about life, overseas trips to America, the list goes on. But they have also been there during some of my most darkest days and I will forever be grateful for them. If you’re reading this, you know who you are. As you can see, something so simple had begun to open new doors for me. It helped me make new friends, enjoy new experiences and one red-herring factor: it would assist me in saving for my first big overseas trip that would eventually lead me into a boxing gym upon my return.

So, in revealing more of these necessary layers of my self, by now you are probably wondering what love story I could possibly have up my sleeve that could relieve you of your suspense?  How could someone this wary be capable of revealing her feelings to someone?  Because growing up, if I liked someone they would never know, I would never admit it to anyone. This or my defense mechanism of friend-zoning them would kick in.  Well that changed after I walked into a boxing gym when I was 22 years old.