Why not?

It all started on a summer evening. Like every other middle class Bengali who is still in Kolkata and has surprisingly managed to get employed, I had a long, tiring, and 'sweaty' day at work. Just as I was gathering my stuff to leave, I was invited on a 'walk to the metro station' by this really hot colleague of mine who is so out of my league that Sakhshi Tanwar would feel a little more comfortable playing Daenerys Targaryen than what I felt.

I was anxious, I was sweaty and to top it all, I was self-conscious to the point of a nervous break down.. Now who wouldn't be conscious if you are as tall as a lamp post with dark circles till your chin and oil pouring out of your skin like the middle-east? I have grown up watching the 'Fair and Lovely' ad which has taught me that to get married, or to get a lover and even to get a job you need to be fair and lovely. 

The moment we stepped outside the office and started walking he asked 'Is something bothering you?' and me being me blurted out, 'I am so sweaty that my pants are sticking to my inner thigh and my underarms feel like jelly fish.' I knew I had made friends with a good man when at this point, my hot colleague burst out laughing. He pat me on my back and said, 'That's good. It proves that you have worked a lot throughout the day.' Thus, the day was made.

The idea, however has stuck to me ever since. Why don't we ever appreciate what is natural? Why are we so ashamed of the fact that we sweat, or have facial hair or have huge feet? 

Well to be honest, by 'we' I actually mean women. I have seen my girl friends and also have subjected myself, to absolute torture when we have spent our own hard earned money to pull hair out of our skin. Waxing every bit of self love that we have and threading our personalities to that perfect arch of an eyebrow. 

I have been told by my male and female friends alike that I sweat like a 'man' but very few appreciate or even acknowledge the fact that I do a lot of things like a 'man' by the social standards. 

I run after the bus like a man without thinking about whether my breasts are drawing attention from all that running. I carry 20 litre water jars up the stairs to the fourth floor of a building, without asking another man for help. I swear like a man, at a man or woman who pisses me off without worrying whether it is 'lady-like' to know of such profanity. So the question is why isn't this ok? Why is it that I am usually taken to be this very angry and volatile person because I behave in the way that naturally comes to me? 

My lack of filters is thus considered to be 'manly' but why on Earth should natural behaviour be the essence of one gender while the others are expected to pretend all the time? 

I will bet my life on this that nobody will be able to give me an answer to these questions other than 'Men and women are different' or 'Women look beautiful when they take care of themselves' or similar such absolutely pointless arguments which basically do not even qualify as an argument because we have already accepted them.

Here I have a request for the handful of readers this blog post may ever get. Can we please start thinking about not stereotyping gender? Can we please start accepting people with all their naturally beautiful flaws? Can we please appreciate women who sweat, as hard workers? Men who go to the salon regularly are not homosexuals by default and even if they are, you and I are nobody to mock them. Men who spend time to look good are not feminine. Why not just accept individuals? Tell me, why not?