To them who feel, the true winners

 Dear Individual,

I met a girl once, she was the pride of her mother and she knew it. She was everything that her mother had ever dreamt of - she was courteous, loved by all, getting an education, skilled and beautiful. 

Her mother often told her of how even though she was one of the most beautiful women in her town, she had to bear many woes - circumcision because merely having female genitalia meant having a susceptibility to sleeping around, not getting educated because education was the men's rights, not getting a say in family affairs because the she wasn't the head - her strength was to be in execution not in instruction. In the midst of these, her mother swore that her daughter will get the life she didn't.

Her mum was the most open person she knew, she spoke carefully and never insulted, never wronged anyone, gave her all and minded her business. So when it first began as whispers that she was a witch, it was the worst thing to hear. Whispers became rumors and rumors became reality until they had to move.

Imagine being called the daughter of a witch, mocked by your fellow 10year olds for having blood sucking feautures or a reality of flying around in the midnight. You'll think she became cold because her mother did, but she didn't.

She loved the hell out of her haters. Even with the jesting, even with the taunts, even with the hatred, she showed them love, it was all she knew.

She didn't become the witch they said she was , she didn't become cold or unreceiving of love, she didn't black out the world and become intolerant of the world instead she became the listener who was there for everybody. She was sensitive; crying when the jesting hurt and just being human.

While this is the part I'm supposed to tell you that because she loved them, they started to tease her less but they didn't, infact it gave them a reason to tease her more.

But for all of us who met her and who got to truly see how difficult it was for her to shine inspite of it all, it was the purest thing. 

I knew a girl who inspite of the hate, shone with love.

So like Jules Ryan said "Here's to the people whose trauma did not give them thick skin. The ones who became more sensitive and insecure, who cry more easily, who get overwhelmed at small things." Here's to those who trauma didn't make them tough and untouchable - you're not survivors, you're superheroes.