Bruised by Blue

Who doesn't like blue? Blueness? It's another name for life. Water may be transparent, but whenever I think of rivers, seas, or lakes, blue water comes to mind. And then the blue sky, blue means life...

Isn't it?

But blue is also the color of pain... if you get hurt, your body turns blue. Whenever I get pricked for a blood test, my arm stays blue for days. Even if someone grabs your arm too hard, a blue bruise appears. Some people cover it with concealer, while others don't even bother hiding it...

It's a color of violence too! It's a visual reminder of pain and injury. Then it becomes a haunting hue of both physical and emotional scars. Have you ever seen this shade of blue? It’s so ugly and unpleasant. I haven’t seen a worse color than this... When the body is hurt and soul is bruised... Have you ever witnessed this blue color gradually turning into black??? it’s as if the whole life is fading under the weight of that ugly blue-black wound!

And then comes to my mind the story of the princess. What was her name? The Princess and the Pea?

A story by Hans Christian Andersen . A prince insists on marrying a real princess. When a woman comes to his door maintaining that she is a real princess, the prince's mother tests her by burying a pea under a huge stack of mattresses and then ordering the woman to sleep on the mattresses. The woman cannot sleep (and her whole body turns black and blue) and therefore passes the test: being a true princess, she is so delicate that the pea keeps her awake. _{sr The text within the bracket is added by me}

Can we women truly be that delicate? We, the emotional beings, have immense strength within us. When we stand together, we can uplift and empower each other in ways no one else can. Our unity and support can be more powerful than any challenge we face. No? And yet we are each other's biggest enemies. No man has harmed a woman as much as women themselves have.

Feeling blue? Who said that for the first time? Why, in this lovely blue ambience, how many times... and I don’t know why, or maybe I do... I was feeling blue...

And then, baby blues... Ugh... Has anyone ever gone through that feeling?

I went through it. The first time, I didn’t even know what this 'baby blues' thing was. I felt like I was barely able to breathe. And then, I still remember, on January 11th, 2010, I handed my daughter to my mother and said, “Take care of her...” Ugh, what a time that was... For days, my family kept taking me to hospitals, worried. And then one night, I was taken to the emergency room, where the doctor on duty diagnosed me. I was suffering from baby blues.

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You might be wondering, my companion, my diary, what these pictures have to do with this text...

But they are deeply connected.

Every day, life teaches you a new lesson and reveals a new dimension. It’s so complicated, yet it becomes easier if certain things, certain attitudes, and certain knots are untangled and untied. But that’s the beauty of it—or perhaps, that’s the pain of it...

These are recent pictures from a function that I not only attended but was also a part of its management, yet somehow felt apart from.