to be seen as the unseen

I. The Unseen

“There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it.”
~George Bernard Shaw

I turned 28 not too long ago. Supposedly the end of my becoming. The age at which all degrees you studied for, all careers you worked for, all people you lived for, it all comes home to roost in a grand mating ritual of souls and private property, (if you’re lucky, with the person of your dreams), so you may then pass the relay stick of becoming to a new life, all while you settle into being.

I’m not turning out to be that kind of 28. The carefully laid out social plan for my becoming fell apart, first when I began the journey away from all traditional career choices (yes, in this economy), and then when I came out of the closet. And though I already feel like I’ve pitched a tent in the widening cracks of our world order, I’m yet to build myself a home. I’m still becoming. Even still, my human condition is thrusting me away from material vanities, and the elaborate and violent social deceptions that sustain them. On most days, it feels like fortifying my life over a frailing fissure. Becoming without role models, without roadmaps, without recognition..

In this chaos of becoming, to be seen seems rare. So rare that weeks can pass without knowing what it feels like, where these weeks then lay roads to months of no reminders that you wear your soul on your skin, and that it fits you just right.

I’m in Goa right now. At a quiet cafe by the beach. A three legged dog sunbathes in the sand, watching the afternoon sun turn the ocean into a thousand glistening shards of mirrors. He looks on, grinning, mouth wide open, as a little girl in a lemon frock points at him from a distance. He pants keenly as a couple, ascended from the beach, cross him, walking towards the cafe, besotted in banter. A man in an iridescent beach poncho comes sits by him, offering him a snack. He’s not interested in snacks, it seems. He gets up, turns his face away and stretches his three legs like they’re four, before walking off. I’m oddly fixated on this dog who’s made this idyllic beach his home. I wonder how long he’s been here. He seems well rested, he seems like he knows when to soak in the sun, when to take a walk, whose leg to lick for a pet, and when to go looking for a snack.

This is my second time in Goa, in just a month, but also in life. I came back within a week of leaving because the first time here ended with a shock paddle to my chest, a defibrillator that revived a gnawing void in my heart, connecting my self to a cave with walls searing hot with an eternally aflame sacral torch, an ever familiar den I had forgotten my way to when I’d decided to discard society’s maps to build one of my own. A very roundabout way of saying I felt seen, but those words don’t exactly convey that it felt like hitting a brick wall face-on.

the three legged dog living his best life

II. The Seen

“In the friendship of adults… People find others and separate themselves from them again; their interests and activities drift apart and are united again…” ~ Georg W F Hegel

My first time in Goa is coming to an end. In two hours, me and my best friend take a cab back home. It has been a beautiful trip. I feel energized, I feel relaxed, I feel loved, I feel ready to go. For the time being, a new friend we made at the hostel has joined us for a game of cards. He’s invited two more guys to join in. One of them is here, and we’re playing Bluff.

My curls are billowing against the table fan, falling to my shoulders as I turn. It has been over two years since I got a haircut (the last time was right after I had come out of the closet). I like how my face looks with these evergrowing locks. I worry I might fit it in too well if I ever got them trimmed. I worry if I fit in again, I might slip back into the closet. And it feels like a home outside the closet is still too far away to step back in for even a beat. What gets pushed under the rug of identity politics and helicopter memes is my whole life, my struggle to be recognized as I am.

The other friend joins in. Let’s call him Arth. He asks our names, not before joking he’ll forget them come morning. I laugh, because I know I’ll forget his too. My laugh would have been in vain. Not his joke though. As I laugh, Arth notices my long hair. Everyone does, no matter where I go. But his gaze feels soft, not suspicious, not intrusive.

We move to a larger table as he introduces us to a new card game. Bluff isn’t for him, he says. His mother doesn’t like it when he lies. So we start playing this new game, and I find myself getting more invested with every round.

Arth gets his speakers, starts playing from his song collection. Maybe it’s the game, maybe it’s that half a glass of wine, but his playlist has me in an ethereal tunnel vision. It’s all the songs I’ve enjoyed by myself, in school, in college, most remembered, some forgotten, for as long as music has been my escape, my little island of sensing seenness. Growing up around the cliches of bollywood music and old party songs, I’m now in a room with Someone New. ‘Electing strange perfections in any stranger I choose’ I find myself singing out loud. Premonition for me, exposition for you.

He’s singing too, we’re the only ones on the table that are. Far away from home, I’m beginning to find myself taking space like I’m still there. He changes the song, this one sounds familiar, I know the lyrics but all I can remember about the artist’s name is a J. Umm… Jack? John? Yes, John, he replies. John Mayer! I almost got it, he exclaims. I make a mental note to return to some more Mayer songs when I’m back home. Between the card game that is in its fifth round, and the music that is in its first hour, it’s already time to leave. My best friend asks if we should leave, our cab driver needs to know, and for the first time it dawns on me that this night has to come to an end, and that for some reason, I don’t want it to. I don’t feel ready to go home anymore.

I feel the intensity of this liminal space, the very liminality now pervades my body and mind. We really have to leave, if we are to beat the morning traffic. But I find the thought of going too abrupt, I feel it breaking an otherwise dormant part of my heart. I negotiate with the inevitability, and we ask the driver if we can leave in another hour. It works, he says. And just like that, the sixth round of the games begins.

I get lost in my thoughts as I shuffle the cards. What am I feeling? I realize how I’ve been sitting, how I’ve been laughing, how I’ve been talking. For all the years I can remember, my body language has betrayed my sexuality, made it an open arena for raised eyebrows and unwarranted speculations. And for all those years, I’ve donned a demeanour that covers my self from scrutiny. Today, in front of all these strangers, that cover feels blown. My best friend looks at me, with gleaming eyes, proud. She sees the joy and freedom I’ve been feeling. It’s all too familiar to her, we live together and she sees this every day. But she also knows how conserved I’ve always been outside our home.

on the last day of my trip, clicked by my best friend

I can tell you that our instincts are sharper than we tend to realize. I’ve been feeling safe and seen before I’ve been aware I’ve been feeling so, before even the thoughts of how I’m carrying myself have kicked in. But this bargain to stay another hour has brought it all to the surface: why am I finding myself drawn to this group of strangers? I feel breathless. For Aisha is playing, and I need my lungs to sing it out loud, like Arth is. Suddenly, I’m unable to meet his eyes.

I ask him if I can play a song. I’ve recently fallen in love with all of Vampire Weekend. As their song Campus plays, I wait for the line ‘Spilled kefir on your keffiyeh’, my secret little joy at the tiny nod to Palestine. He loves the beats, he says. I pretend to be busy in thoughts, I pretend I did not hear him. Being myself, being seen feels too vulnerable all of a sudden. The joys of being seen come with the risks of being judged. I don’t feel ready if I have a choice.

Even as I pull away, he pays attention to every word I say. He remembers what I say. He finishes the thought I’m trying to articulate. I can tell he’s smart, he’s kind. The warmth is inviting but why fly too close to the sun? As I get up to go pee, I run into Ronit, another guy I’ve been running into the past two days here. Ronit has those peering eyes, the ones that lose sight of what I’m saying when they fall on the way I speak or stand. I’ve run into these Ronits most of my life. He seems controlling, dismissive. His silent gazes reveal the power he knows he holds, to ridicule, to pass judgements. I wish he stops talking, so I can go pee, so I can go sit back at the table where I feel safe. I do feel safe, I realize. Strangely familiar, tribally fitting in. I come back with hair tied up in a waterfall ponytail. I give them a shake to make them settle, and as I do it, I catch Arth smiling at me. It feels good to be back at the table.

This hour passes by unbearably fast. Our driver calls, he’s waiting at the gate. It truly is time for goodbyes. The guys say they’ll drop us at the gate. I look at Arth. He works Sundays, he should have been asleep hours ago, but he’s been here, having a good time with us. Why was I so scared of this recognition, this comfort? I feel the seeds of a new friendship. I want to tell him how much I loved our time together. The words are on my throat. It was a wonderful time. I loved the game, I love your playlist, it’s the same as mine. I don’t want to leave just yet. Do you think we’ll meet again? Do you want to stay in touch? But I fail to say them out loud. It’s too late, I’m in my shell. Years of a fear of being myself feels sticking close, like a second shadow.

I drag my feet towards the gate. The slowest I’ve walked in ages. One foot barely following the other. I trip on a stick, or maybe it was a pipe. But my balance has been lost a while ago. Was I too much? I wonder. Was I too flamboyant, too excitable for a guy my age? Did I overthink it? Was the connection just in my head? As if stopping me at this mental crossing, Arth says ‘It was very lovely meeting you.’ He sounds earnest. He leans in for a hug. Do you want to exchange socials? This might sound weird but I feel like we’d make great friends. You know, thank you for being so gentle with me, I’m not used to this. ‘You too,’ is all I manage to say. It feels like I said goodbye. He feels rare, how I felt today feels rarer. I smile, not making eye contact as we both leave for our cab.

III. Unseen again

“If you’re not speaking it you’re storing it, and that gets heavy.”
~ Christina Isabel

I’ve never felt this restless. Mumbai has a tendency to suck you into a temporal vortex, a rush of running in circles. There’s four corners, maybe five, that you feel allowed to exist, and you must settle into those like a butterfly who’s followed the wrong light and now must make peace with resting on walls, counting your time till a breeze shows you where to fly next. But I don't want to rest. I feel a void. Like I sensed the warmth of the light, like I was seen in the light, and I must now lie down as the dark dusk descends.

I ask Arth’s friend if he’d be okay giving me his number. He is. Hey! Last night was so fun. I felt so safe and seen and connected, it’s still stuck with me. I’m not able to shake it off! Unable to say it, I text him to let him know I loved our game last night. He says so did he. I tell him I loved his playlist, and it’s the same as mine. He says he’s glad. I tell him to check out more Vampire Weekend songs. He says he will. Maybe it’s the texts or maybe it’s the way I’m reading them but I suddenly feel strange, like I’m talking to a different person. Was that connection in my head? The void pulses, it grows bigger.

I want to go to Goa again, solo this time. I don’t want to settle into the corners Mumbai grants. I want to sit and write stories at the beach. I feel like meeting more people. I’m sure I’m wrong to think most people I meet are judgy, calculative, cold. I’ve never traveled alone, so maybe this is what will fill my void. Almost on a whim, I pack my bag and leave just as fast as I came. For Goa, for the second time in a month, and also ever, all by myself.

The first day here at the hostel, I’m greeted by three doctors, towering looks, intimidating accents, careless demeanours. They claim my bed and I feel too fragile to argue. (I get it back eventually but it leaves me feeling hostile.) I meet Porri from Switzerland, he’s friendly but he minds his own business. I admire that. I run into others, some reserved, some eager, some friendly. I feel the warmth some strangers lend me, I appreciate it. I reciprocate it.

But the void stays, like a growing itch.

I ask Arth for a good place by the beach I can write all day. He recommends me the best one there is. I work from there four days out of the seven I have. The staff there know by the second day that I like my juices without ice. They don’t ask me again. I go stand by the beach in the evenings, watching the sun set. I call my mom, she warns me I may step on some dangerous fish. I tell her that’s never happened, only to notice a stingray resting just two steps away. Guardian angel, my best friend texts my mom is. I watch the sun go down, returning with sand swept feet to my table. The serenity has my heart full. But the void remains. Strangers feel strange. No one bats an eye, neither do I. No one plays my favorite songs, neither do I.

So I text Arth again, finding some excuse to convince myself what I had felt a week ago was real. I get a polite, formal reply. I feel like I’ve been dragging a dead horse. One whose limbs have been scraped off by the sands of the beaches of time. At once, the completeness of feeling seen has led to the void of being unseen. I feel tormented.

a little leaf i spotted on my second trip to goa

I lean into Freud. Maybe years of living a closeted, double life at home and in college has left my psyche famished. Maybe in the facades of my closet, the safety and the sweetness of being truly seen by my parents and friends has evaded me so much, maybe the act of just being has been so scarce, that a stranger treating me with ordinary decency and warmth stirs something so deeply unfamiliar, that it becomes a crisis of the id.

I lean into Hegel. Maybe in all these years of hiding, I’ve lived and practised the negation of my self for so long that I have forgotten the need to be recognised as my self. Maybe the void is just the unfolding and overcoming of my inability to reconcile the feared other’s acceptance of my self.

I turn to my friends. I tell them how profoundly hit I am, I ask them if they’ve felt the way I feel. Some suggest I turn to AI for help, others say I need to meet more people. Some get it, others find it silly. A queer friend suggests he feels it too, in new places with new people who are nice. When feeling threatened and out of place is the standard, he says, brief encounters of camaraderie, of joy and connection seem like pit stops, if not home.

Three weeks pass. I am back in Mumbai. Loved ones feel distant, strangers feel cold. Routine weighs heavy on the soul. I still miss the fluidity of that night, its sheer gentleness. Downplaying what I’m going through isn’t helping, talking about it isn’t helping, intellectualizing it is definitely not helping. All thoughts turn to feelings of doubt and regret. I start turning on myself, against the part of me that had leapt into the closet at the first instance of feeling seen. I wonder, again, what would have happened had I had the courage to be myself, to express myself boldly, gently, authentically. I miss the part of me that would wear his heart on his sleeve. I used to be proud of him. Why did he hide? Have I truly come out of the closet yet?

When we’d met had left a strong impression on me. I’d felt a sense of safety and connection that’s rare for me with new people. And I think I was seeking to prolong that connection. I text Arth. What I should have said the night we were leaving. The authenticity I robbed myself of. Sending that text feels like putting a stake for a future in which I’m bold, where I’m not weary from fear, where I can give experiences and connections the warmth and effort they call for. But it’s not three weeks ago. It is today. I realise, almost immediately after sending this, how late this is. I feel I read too much into it. So I’ll just let it be. It’d surely be a delight to cross paths again. No pressure to respond. Have a good time! I text him and archive the chat. I know there won’t be any reply.

I feel brazen, unhinged. I miss the time when adulthood was years away, and I could still dream of it being easier, safer, tidier. I miss the promise of having a world I could take space in, feel secure in.

I show the text I sent to a very close queer friend. I feel embarrassed, confused, and maybe partly glad. At least that I finally shared what I had felt, even if too little and too late. She tells me not to be so hard on myself. She says queer teenage comes in our twenties. Because our actual teens are spent in fight or flight.

I feel naive, immature, childish. I yearn for a wisdom that will come only when this has passed. I can’t wait to be a self assured, confident, secure twenty five year old, but I guess it’ll come in my thirties.

IV. Seeing as Seen

“Life ain't short, but it sure is small.
You get forever but nobody at all.
It don't come often, and it don't stay long.
But just remember on the way home,
You don't ever have to feel alone.”
~ John Mayer

Months pass, and sobriety eventually hits. Goa is now a glimmer of light in the rear mirror as I drive out the tunnel of my feelings, into the bright lights of an unrelenting adult life. A friend has passed away in an accident. I miss her. I miss my dog, I miss my grandma. And yet I still am as clueless about loss as ever. I’m stuck moving houses, and so I’m stuck without a house. Since February, I officially have more married friends than single ones. There’s cobwebs beginning to form in my bank account. Life, true to itself, has loved to keep happening.

The memory of that last night, the first time in Goa has gone through its phases. From being an endearing enigma to being a painful parable to being a mirthful murmurous memory, it’s exhausted its cycles of transformation and now quietly sits in my neural box of fond associations.

I don’t feel like a teenager anymore. In fact, I could settle into my rocking chair in a house with a backyard, a cup of tea in one hand, a book of folk tales in the other, smiling into my little parcel of sky between high-rises, waiting for the same flock of birds that soar by every twenty minutes before sunset.

Maybe I’m aging out of lingering questions. Why did fleeting moments carry such life changing weight? Why did a short interaction register a deep existential meaning? Why did I crave being seen and yet fear being unseen, at once bringing both possibilities to life? And most importantly, what did I not see in myself that made me feel the need for a new pair of eyes?

Whether it is Ronit or Arth, or a kind stranger or a hostile confidant, perhaps taking space is as much my choice as giving space is there’s. Maybe the fear of being myself made me put people on a pedestal from which their offering of decency and warmth was seen by me as permission to be equal. Maybe the fact that I sought safety implied the abundance of threat, pushing me into a cocoon around Ronits and pulling me out with wings around Arths.

But maybe outside this dialectic of threat-safety, lies a more real world of adults just like me, trying their best to see others and be seen, some of whom see themselves for who they are, while others know only the image of the selves they see in others. Maybe the cold are lost to themselves, and the warm are lost to others, and maybe those who find themselves are better equipped to find others and so maybe, to be seen as to see is to find myself in myself and only then others. Maybe to be seen as the unseen was mostly to not see my self by myself, and so, maybe to be truly seen is to truly be, to then see as being and being as seen.

Maybe as soon as I and as long as I see myself, be with myself, and from there, seek myself in others and others in me, maybe I won’t be lost, the world won’t seem strange, and warmth won’t seem arbitrary and rare.

If there’s anything I’m taking from that experience, if there’s any way I’m learning to shake off the questions that have clung to me ever since, it is that my authenticity isn’t a privilege to myself or others, it is the essence of my existence. And so to be alive, to feel alive, is to not forget the true meaning of coming out of the closet, that I owe it to myself to be myself for the rest of my life.

No more of being unseen, no more of being seen as the unseen.