Being straight!

Being a straight A student: Not that I have ever been one (and thank god for that), but I have heard from friends who were that it wasn’t as easy as we think it is! While the rest of the world thinks you have it all, that it’s a cakewalk for you, that life is easy because you don’t seem to work hard and yet, the As just keep pouring in, you yourself are embroiled in an internal conflict. Being a teacher’s pet doesn’t exactly make you popular among your peers, you are considered an ‘outsider’ and u don’t quite fit in! You’d rather score less marks and ‘belong’ with your friends instead of considered a geek with no social skills…

Being straight forward: Yes, it has its disadvantages, and God knows I have suffered. For one, you inevitably say things without thinking them through, and immediately regret them, but by then, it’ too late. You end up hurting people you love, and you are perpetually caught with your foot in the mouth, until you feel completely handicapped in a social situation, to the extent that you are scared to open your mouth, afraid that you will end up saying the wrong things at the wrong time. And being in the corporate world just magnifies this problem because you haven’t mastered the art of diplomacy and you are yet to get over the disease which prompts you to lay all your cards on the table in black or white, unpretentiously…

Having straight hair: Yes, I am not someone who was naturally endowed with poker straight silky hair. So like most teenaged girls with frizzy, wavy unmanageable hair I grew up admiring movie stars and models who flaunted their shiny long hair which glistened on the screen as I dolefully looked down at my curls. Once in a while I would get them ironed temporarily, admire myself for a couple of days, and then be back to my normal self, cursing my hair every day after a particularly fast auto ride which succeeded in making my hair look like a tangled up birds’ nest. So till now, my hair experiments have been like my relationships: short lived. But post my Hyderabad hair experiment, I decided to go all the way, to make that one year commitment. Now that I am earning and all, I thought it was the best time to take that leap of faith (before I am thrown out and jobless again). So three hours later and five grands poorer, I was there finally! My childhood dream come true. Only it was a nightmare… I HATED MY NEW LOOK! Yes I did look awkwardly sophisticated, but I didn’t feel sophisticated. I just felt like my usual gawky, crude self with a wig! I so so so want my mess of curls back. At least I will feel myself!!!

Being straight: This one is a no brainer! You thought being straight was easy? It was conventional? It was the socially acceptable thing? Wrong! The point is it deprives you of 50 percent of the population, and being a girl it’s harder, because it deprives you of the better 50 percent! So you are stuck with the rotten half, and even in that rotten half, the good ones are already taken!!

When did being straight become such a pain?