Big girls don't cry - Sometimes a little stranger's calm smile is all the assurance you need to know that tomorrow will be a new day.

 Big girls don’t cry

It is so very easy to talk about body positivity and telling women to reclaim their lives instead of letting the world shame them for who they are and how they choose to carry themselves. It is, I know, because I do the same thing very often, but it ain't easy and often our circumstances force us into losing the fierce streak and giving in to the pressure. But Looking back to that day, in  retrospect it feels rather silly, how my emotions took over in a purely natural, human situation.
Here's the deal, we were out on a vacation. I was tagging along as usual with my aunt, and her family, why as usual ? You may be wondering, well we shall take that up later. Back to the story, it was a pleasant weeklong vacation planned for the September month in 2016. I was freshly out of grad school and my cousins were on a break from work. Perfect time we supposed, only problem being the untimely knock of the crimson tide a week earlier than expected. I woke up with a mild abdominal pain, and thanks to my cousin sister, easily managed to score a pack of sanitary napkins after a little wandering around the unfamiliar streets of Mumbai city. All was good. Chaos ensued at our next destination of travel which was supposed to be Shirdi, a small town in Maharashtra believed to be blessed by Sai. After a restless night scarred with waking up multiple times out of pain and cramps I managed to get a few hours of sleep finally dozing off close to 2 in the morning. My aunt woke me up around 4:30 so we could all get ready in time to be able to attend the morning aarti. My sister and I coordinated our outfits and everything went by smoothly. Getting back to our accommodation, I thankfully decided to put on denims and change out of whites to avoid any unwanted staining mess. Next destination was Shignapur, a long drive from Shirdi, with scenic roads flanked by vast fields of pomegranate and grape on either side, and almost no functional restaurants or public conveniences in sight. The rental car we took was another menace as the driver lacked any sense of hygiene, when asked to stop by any place with a restroom he stopped the car at a shed on the road where a man sold sugarcane juice. When asked for directions to the washroom, they pointed towards bushes in the distance. It was repulsive to think about the ordeal of women who lived there and worked in those fields everyday. By the time we reached the temple premises, unfortunately I had soaked through my thick denims and a blood stain large enough to cover my entire rear had formed. I hurried to the washroom outside the temple facility to get a change of napkin in place. Not left with many options, I tucked out my oversized T-shirt and used it, to cover the stain as much as I possibly could.
This temple was the same one that had been under much controversy over the past few years, because of the stringent rules around entry of female devotees and I knew I would be attracting a lot of unwanted attention with my period blood stained denims. I decided against going into the temple and sat on the wooden benches outside the small stalls selling supplies like floral garland and other paraphernalia. My relatives all went inside and I sat down to catch a breath, but just as I sat there alone a weird sense of shame and grief wrapped me and I felt a certain kind of helplessness. It was just a blotch of blood, from my own body and of no violent origin and yet it made me cry like a child. I sat there holding my head in my palms and cried an awful lot before gaining my composure. When I finally wiped away my tears, and looked up, there was a small child, barely 6-7 years old sitting in front of me. He came towards me, looked at me with a confused look and asked me why I had been crying. I felt blank, I realized there was no need for me to cry in the first place and just like that a smile crept in. The child smiled at me and we exchanged smiles, and just like that he ran away to the call of his parents standing in the distance. I felt better and took a deep breath, then walked up to another lady setting up her stall selling fruit snacks and grabbed a bite while waiting on my aunt and her family to return. We went back to our accommodation in Shirdi, I changed out of the soiled clothes and washed them well, put on a fresh pair and then took a nice long nap. Sometimes a little stranger's calm smile is all the assurance you need to know that tomorrow will be a new day.