I remember the first time I wrote a (love) letter, thinking that I had finally understood what love was. Although I had not been aware of its social profoundness and commitment, both inherent to the notion of love, I already did understand one aspect: love is to be shared. I did what was then 'necessary' to share the love I felt. I gave the letter to the boy in my class. Nothing special, it just included some words on how much I enjoyed spending time and playing football with him. Not surprisingly, as the 10 years old boy that he was, he found it weird. I, on the contrary, was really proud of myself. This, because the only expectation I hold to was the one towards myself, of me giving him the letter that I had spent time and reflections on. I did not want him to respond, to be particularly nice or anything else. His reaction was not this important to me. Yet, some hours later, confusion took over me when the girls in my class asked me about the letter. “Why would you even write one ”, did one ask me. For the same reasons I am writing this one. This does not just stem from the obvious truth that love is essential to my existence as a (human) being. It derives from moments that I have experienced and that I would describe as illustrative excerpts of depersonalisation and derealisation.
Within the last two years, various men have asked me about my opinions on marriage. Whether I would want to marry and if yes, what kind of man and in which city. Strange, I know. Even more if one considers that they were no dates, no close friends, perhaps something like acquaintances. These men were people I would have described as rather random, not meaningful encounters back then. But as is often the case in life, these moments were more meaningful; not because of the men that asked me these questions or because they are particularly important to me. They are not, and probably will never be. Their meaning (fullness) resulted from the nature of these encounters, with the fullness determined, again, by moments of revelation and confusion. To understand the confusion these questions have caused and still are causing in me, it is helpful to keep in mind my personal background. I am the daughter of Kurdish refugees, of immigrants, working-class people. My life has been grounded in patterns and parts steadily shaped by pain and perception, belonging and becoming, reflection and remembrance. Love has taken an essential role in these patterns, naturally, as love is inherent to the struggles of the struggling I do find myself duty-bound.
A (love) letter to the men who ask me about marriage
Wer Rûne Li Cem Min
KƎRƎM KƎ
Now some may ask themselves why I am writing about love in the case of these experiences. It is in no instance due to any belief on my part that marriage is the only expression of love, or that marriage and love are per se exclusive or inclusive. Nor is it what Black pioneers, such as Baldwin, hooks, and Lorde, rightly state, namely, that (self-)care and love constitute "an act of the will - namely both an intention and an action" (hooks) making them a prerequisite for any (de)liberating feminist society. In fact, it is because these questions always lead me into a realm where I do not, or perhaps where I should not, recognise my surroundings and myself. I sit in a café or look at my screen, "tell me, what should the person you're going to marry be like?", as if such a question could grips me most profoundly. Why are you asking me this, I think, and why is this confusing me right now? Am I communicating something subconsciously that this man is asking me this right now? What does he imagine me like and why does he even prefer to imagine anything at all rather than trying to get to know me?
Illustrative extracts of depersonalisation and derealisation. Derealisation as part of a stale perception of this context, which is alienating in my understanding of love and community. Depersonalisation, as I must pause for a moment and reach out again for my love that is made obviously and deliberately irrelevant by all these questions. I do not want to be asked when I am getting married. It is not important to me. I want to be asked what strives me to struggle the struggle of the struggling, what embraces my mind and thinking. I want to be asked about my opinions that perceive love as an act of allowing and accessing, the soul revelation and encounters. I want to be encountered as much as I want these encounters for a community. A community in which you and I meet not as you and I and not as we, but as you-me. Love is to be shared, a connection, which leads me to this (love) letter for you. The next time, instead of asking me when and who I intend to marry, why don’t we sit down and think about how what strives us?