The Confessions Of A Concubine

Memories 13

Memories

When I was a child, I used to be afraid of my family or my parents’ judgement in an almost reverential way.

My life went on in uncertainty with one eye always watching attentively to see what reactions my actions would arouse.

They have never needed to tell me what they wanted me to be, what choices they wanted me to make or what decision they wanted me to take.

One gaze.

One gaze was enough to make me unconsciously do what they wanted me to do.

I might have made different choices, but such a feeling never crossed my mind, so it was not in my mind.

I just wanted to please them, do so, even because it was all I could do.

Without realizing it, in those days the little concubine took shape and started to take her first steps.

I remember that I used to love music lessons that I took from an old orchestra conductor fondly. After retiring, he moved not very far away from my parents’ house.

I used to wait for Thursday afternoons anxiously. On the fourth day of every week, I used to go to my master’s house. He used to welcome me in his living room and give me music lessons, letting me practise on his piano.

On one occasion I came back home from school and we all gathered around the table. My sister was sitting on her high chair, holding ladles and lids and making an incredible noise. My mother smiled at me and told me, “Misia, your dad and I have decided that you’re not taking your music lessons any longer, but from next week you’re attending artistic gymnastics lessons at the municipal gym. It is not normal that all the girls of your age attend those lessons, while you are growing more and more introverted thanks to your music!”

Her words were a bolt from the blue. Nothing had made me foresee such a sudden change in her, but I had to accept my family’s decision with regret and without saying a word.

I was not made for physical activity, and that is why my teacher let me be the last person to take exercise. Sometimes she did not even make me exercise, while all the others did.

I have never felt obliged to behave in a certain way. I think whatever I did, I did in an extreme light way, led by the trusty hand of the one who gave birth to me.

If it is right to follow the social and behavioural rules that are imposed by the family that has raised us, it is also right to ask ourselves some “if” questions and consider all the “buts” that are buzzing in our heads.

But I had no "ifs" or "buts", since I did not trust the hands that were guiding me.

A wise guide that claims without asking, gets without making requests, appropriates something without saying, “Thank you”.

I could have told my family that I wanted to take further music lessons, but I was not familiar with autonomous thinking.

On second thoughts, everything seemed so normal to me that if I had had to take a decision and I had not been able to see any kins of mine near me then, I would have stopped the world and sought advice.

Advice, namely the most stupid and superb thing one can ask and claim to give.

My grandmother used to say, “It is one thing to die. It is another thing to talk about death.”

Nobody but she might have never wanted to manipulate me or shape me according to her wishes by sectioning me, saving the good parts and rejecting the unwanted ones.

Nobody but she might have been the one with whom, without realizing it, my true SELF used to come out and move freely, dancing with its eyes closed.

I remember when we used to split our sides at very stupid things and get emotional while watching love films that were broadcast on television and that she used to love so much.

She used to caress my hair, making me feel unique in the world.

Feeling unique. What a wonderful feeling!

My teens began and bloomed in the shadow of strict rules.

I never went out in the evening or asked to let me do that.

I used to shelter in music and reading, which allowed me to escape from what I would not regard as a prison, even though a prison was such that it was.

***

I have no unpleasant memories to delete, rather a series of faded days that I spent dreaming that I was living like in a telefilm.

I had a passion for studies, but I also used to study to please my family, which never seemed to be satisfied, though. In doing so, they probably thought I would have a reason to make better.

So, I got used to thinking I was nothing special.

I rarely looked at myself in the mirror. I thought I was a bit ugly, simply because life taught me not to trust myself or believe in my potential.

Reminding my days, I’m just realizing now that I was always expected to do my best, but once done, it was not even worth mentioning or complimenting, and my destination had to be always pushed a little further.

I graduated from high school with honours, which also seemed to be taken for granted.

Teachers used to urge everybody to allow me to continue my education, but my family did not support such a suggestion, making it unavoidable for me to look for a job.

So, the joyful future that I used to conceive every night, while I was reading my books, ended up accepting a position of warehouseman in a supermarket in my town and having a boyfriend that I did not even know whether I liked.

When Philip entered my life, all the girls of my age and their own boyfriends have got engaged for a long time and my mother asked me why I had not mine.

I did not choose him nor, frankly, did even I consider before, and I had no comparisons to make.

Philip and I used to meet at the public gardens, where cicadas would chirp, on summer afternoons. On one occasion he declared his love for me, and I accepted his proposal.

I ran back home breathless and pulled my grandmother inside her small bedroom. I told her what was the matter with me. Her soft cheeks turned red and smiled at me, showing all her sweetness.

“Mind the world, Misia. It is not good, but you are so sweet that you deserve all good things in the world. What bright eyes you have!”

So, I asked her, “How do I realize who is the right person? And, above all, where can I find him and how?”

Then she told me patiently where she met my grandfather, whom I could barely remember.

“We did not know each other, but I must admit that I was lucky to find him, my baby. I was good at bending my head down when needed and teaching him to do that when it would be his turn. A right person does not exist, Misia. A person needs to become the one for another person and, at the same time, the latter needs to become the one for the former.”

After a few days, my grandmother had a stroke that stole her ability to speak and make most movements. A few of my father’s friends brought her back home. Her knees were scraped and her glasses were broken. She had gotten sick and had fallen in the square opposite the parish.

She was looking at me. Her eyes were very large. It seemed like she wanted to tell me something. When we used to be alone, I would stretch out a hand between the bed rails and she would shake me firmly by the hand. Then I began to understand what it meant to feel impotent and alone.

A thousand questions were in my head, but I had no courage to ask them, so I never got an answer to them.

My grandmother passed away silently one autumn morning. Her silvery laughter did not echo among the walls of my house any more, leaving a void inside me that was unfillable.

Life took an important part away from me, that is the only person who used to believe in me and wanted me all, just the way I was.

“You are imperfect and wonderful,” my grandmother used to say to me.

Imperfect is just how I’ve been feeling since the day she died.