[04] Paper Peace
"Don't be so Western. Learn to uphold our family values."
Brown kids, more often than not, tend to carry their parents into their present and future with them — sometimes literally and at other times in spirit.
I fall into the latter, but I'm no different.
To be the eldest daughter in an Indian family comes with the glory and pride of being and having the first of everything. Perhaps other families are different, but mine treated me like the best thing that happened to them. However, as I grew older, I was taught that keeping the peace at home was the most important duty. The home cannot and should not be broken, and its my job to help maintain that. Boys, of course, played by different rules of expression. They got to swing their intellectual violence, emotional stuntedness, and verbal barbs all through the home. It seemed their duty to test the extent and durability of tissue-thin domestic peace. And it seemed their right to break things.
"That's not fair. They've done so much for you."
This filial piety, this collectivist worldview, means that I always know where I come from. I know who I represent. But is that a healthy place, and are they emotionally well? These questions unravel the careful construction of the home. And, at best, asking such questions breaks character; at worst, it breaks bonds.
I grew to be a disillusioned young woman. I couldn't trust the system I was born into because only the pliable, obedient women got to exist in the good books. I couldn't relate to them at all — no one is that pliable all of the time. They didn't seem like people who could resolve conflict, seek professional help to resolve it healthily, or let alone acknowledge that conflict exists in the home.
So. What now?
"No, you mustn't say that. Don't fight on my behalf — they've been a good [role] to you."
Now, in my own home, I reach inside and dredge up the memories of helping the women keep the peace. I bring them all to the surface and untangle them from the childish hatred clinging to them. They had their reasons — and I had a full home because of them. I cannot hate their decades of effort to keep us whole.
However, I can learn.
In our home, we keep the peace. It's not my work alone.
Perhaps I lose a bit of Brown culture here and some gendered tradition there in the process. Maybe we'll raise children who understand that disagreement doesn't mean disrespect (oh, the horror!). What I know for sure is that we've built a home where peace is everyone's work. And because of it, no matter how fragile, it becomes everyone's reward.