Dear Readers,
I decided to jump into the familiar excitement of the blogging challenge of A to Z this year at 10 pm, last night which happened to be the 31st of March. I'd been toying with the idea of giving it a miss this year on account of lack of preparedness and a big lack of time. But, the pull of this challenge is too irresistible. So, here I am.
This year's badge is a tribute to Jeremy Hawkins, the official graphics guy for the A to Z Challenge, who passed away.
The white spots on the base of her throat hadn’t
responded to the steroid cream her GP had prescribed. If anything, the pale
white spots had turned red, angry and frustrated. Deep down, in the recesses of
her heart, where her Indian heritage lived and guided her actions and thoughts—about
love, the self but never about the two together—she knew. But she buried the
knowing under fluffy blankets of optimism on a cold, clear autumn morning in West
London and went to see her GP.
“It’s Vitiligo.” He announced, without taking his eyes
off of the UV light he was holding on the red, blotchy spots which used to be
brown skin but were assimilating with the whiteness of the country she’d migrated
to.
“No!” concrete tears stuck in her throat. She sobbed
out, “Really?”
“At least it’s not cancer.” The GP offered solace. “It’s
only superficial!” he hammered the concrete, hammered her hopes.
She left the clinic. Outside, the blue sky was
sparkling with autumn sunshine. The air was crisp. She unwrapped her scarf. The
air hit the spots. She’d kept them covered for over six months with scarves,
turtle necks in summer and band-aids in the swimming pool. She let them drink
in the air—at last. But her feet, her knees, her brown heritage sitting deep
inside her trembled like an earthquake—seismic shifts to how she’d look when the
white spots start to grow, multiply and mutate her skin, her body and how people will see 'her' made her slump on the road, outside the GP’s clinic, under a
large chestnut tree full of red, yellow and golden leaves that once were green.
