They call me names that shouldn’t matter to me, but the sting of those still manages to pierce my skin and leave a mark. Neutral people claim that blames should not hurt as long as a person is not guilty. But aren’t those blames a finger risen onto one’s character? I say it is often the other way around. When a soul is naïve and pure to its core, the echo of wrong stays to reverberate through it. And it stays for long, even when a person enters into a deep slumber during a few minutes of the night.
They say I am losing my excess weight to look for someone to live with, to broaden the scope of my opportunities. They claim that the widow couldn’t mourn her husband enough to stay indoors. Rather she has come all the way to the park to lose her weight. They call it, “A definite shot to trap another man.” “An attempt to look pretty to draw more eyes meaning more men to herself.” But these accusations are only the tip of the iceberg.
People have a way of making even the driest topics sound the crispiest, making others curious of all that is talked about and developing a knack for digging into more. A better half is a life partner for a lifetime, and if he departs in between, it does not mean that love left with him too. That is what people fail to see or understand. They just want to talk for the sake of killing their time, forgetting that they kill hearts in the process as well.
What is far more surprising though, I wonder as I guzzle water hungrily after a furious round of miles and a battle with my bones, that people really are shallow. And with them, their thinking zigzags through narrow tunnels too, making only enough space for them to nurture lowly thoughts. Could getting into the sight of another man be the only reason for a widow to shed the extra pounds?
Tomorrow will raise the sun that will satisfy my hungry soul too. An opportunity to live again and a reason to smile again as well; the smile that I have been literally impatient to paint across my face.
Tomorrow, I will weight against the machine and hope to see a fall in the digits of my body mass. And tomorrow will also be the surgery of my only son. The reason why I strive to live and also the reason why I work against my wishes to lose my weight in this phase of my age with no intentions to please anyone or get someone’s attention.
As the sun rises in a few impatient, undying hours, the doctors will conduct a kidney transplant, the shift of my organ into my son’s body so that he can see the light of the day despite the failure of both of his kidneys. I had to lose the weight for the kidney transplant to be successful, had I not shed the pounds for my son, he would not have lived, and with him, my heart would have also lost the reason to beat.
I don’t tolerate the snide remarks on my character for getting to another man but to save my son’s life. I am truly misconstrued.
