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Alone in Manhattan: Searching For My Minority Within a Minority

A 20-SOMETHING SIKH-AMERICAN

Up on the third floor, past the cookbook and dieting sections, deep in the confines of the Barnes & Noble's, was a nook for the broken hearted optimists of the city. I had never ventured over to the self-help section of the bookstore, but when the man I thought I was going to marry decided he just wasn’t sure I was “the one”, the mixture of dark thoughts and angst had me searching for anything that would help me understand and ease the ache of rejection.

As a Sikh-American woman hoping to one day marry a Sikh-American man, my dating options were limited from the start. The shaved-faced tousled-haired majority was white noise, as I searched and hoped for my own perfect, bearded and turbaned Sikh man, one who was perfectly blended into Western culture and norms, but still had that core of Eastern culture I could relate to.

Like most single 20-somethings, I knew the right person was a minority in a sea of bad dates and relationships. Finding this minority within a cultural minority, however, is twice as hard. As I crawled into the era known as ‘the late 20s’, my ideas of ‘Mr. Right’ began to sway and I began to overlook glaring incompatibilities between myself and the men I dated.

Mr. Good Enough was the new Mr. Right.

Then I met him, a charming and sweet 6’1 Sikh male who worked hard, played hard and had a flair for old-fashioned romance which I found delightful. We spent a year together, learning about one another and eventually imagining our lives together, our children, our home; my visions of the future now completely entangled with thoughts of him.

Our relationship, in its beginning stages was brilliant, complete with lust and the feelings of new love, both of us blind to the other’s faults, the incompatibility between us simmering under the surface of our punch drunk love. We had our differences but I
somehow rationalized them all, reminding myself once while walking the city streets alone, that everyone was different and compromise and understanding were key to a healthy relationship.

I quietly convinced myself that finding someone reasonably sweet in a minority of a minority was good enough and I kept my mind open and my patience level high as I pushed away my reservations and thought about the end goal - a marriage, an end to the worry of being alone, an end to the nagging from every Sikh-Indian in my family’s social circle.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, he was not the type to stow away his doubts and, month after month, yet another flaw he found in me would get highlighted.

“You should read more news."

"Why don’t you watch sports."

"Your friends are weird."

"We’re really different."

"That dress doesn’t look right on you.”

And then, the final nail in the coffin: “We should go on a break - I’m just not sure this will work.”

Being the oftentimes emotionally irrational girl that I am, I cried hysterically and mourned the loss; I convinced myself that this was completely unexpected. How could my perfect Mr. Right, the father of my future and yet-to-be-conceived children, just end our perfectly compatible partnership? (Clearly delusional - another symptom of the broken hearted!)

We discussed our concerns about our differences many times; going on breaks, followed by reunions, then breaks again and then finally, one last, very succinct end to the proverbial roller-coaster that defined the last few months of our relationship. I realized through these recurring break-ups and make-ups that, just as he was my minority within a minority, I was his.

Months after our final bittersweet good-bye, I would still get calls from him saying, “Maybe someday - but right now I’m not sure.”

To this comment, I wanted to say, “I’m not sure either, but I’m willing to try!”

But I refrained, and continued to keep this reasonably nice, 6’1 Sikh man on a pedestal. When you are looking for “the one” in an already small pool, while your Sikh-Indian family reminds you daily of your twenty-eight-year-old ticking biological clock, your own thoughts become fuzzy and you allow things like severe criticisms from your skewed version of Mr. Right to flow and invade your brain. Your free time, once filled with a leisurely dose of reality television and pop culture news, gets replaced with attempts to learn football terminology and the who’s who in politics. You decide to fix your 110 lb petite body by eating less and working out more, all in an attempt to fix yourself, to quiet the clock, to quiet your beloved Mr. Right and to quiet your own insecurities.

And even with all that, it ends. It ends and you’re left feeling confused, anxious and utterly broken.

Thus I ended up in the bookstore, standing amongst the self-help books because they were cheaper than a therapist and I was convinced the words from these wise writers would heal me, make me stronger, and even change me into someone he could love. I stood there longing for a mister, any sort of mister, right or wrong, the ache for someone becoming stronger than the idealistic notion of someone right. I stood there, with my pent up thoughts of inadequacy suffocating me, making me lose my mind as I determined that clearly, it was me that needed to change.

I stood there and looked around me, my anxiety building book title after book title, each title enticing another change in my personality; traits many others in my life deemed as wonderful I now wanted to change simply because of one person’s constant flow of critique.

I sat down in the aisle, and thought about it then, and I realized, the problem wasn’t me and the problem wasn’t him.

The problem was that the fear of being alone, the fear of not finding someone, was so vast, that we often look for solace in the arms of another who is simply not a compatible counterpart.

In the middle of a Barnes & Noble's, around other perfectly normal people looking for unanswerable questions, I had found mine.

I left the bookstore empty handed.

My self-discovery had started to heal my confidence, and I was sure my heart was close behind.

As I walked up 3rd Avenue, I realized, I will always be that girl who likes dessert just a little too much, who isn't interested enough in politics to devote an entire evening debating the pros and cons of a specific party, who likes wearing billowy designer dresses while wandering the New York City streets aimlessly and who is just a little too loud once in a while. Yet, I am also that girl who graduated suma cum laude from her undergraduate college, worked in a top consulting firm in Manhattan, pursued higher education in the form of graduate school, bakes amazing cupcakes and loves with an open heart and mind.

This mix of successes and quirks is what completes me. Standing in the bookstore that day, my mind swimming with grief and a crisis of identity, I realized we are all wonderfully atypical in our own ways.

Now, I close my ears to the criticisms and that incessant ticking clock manifested in the grumblings of my Indian-born elders as they admonish the new-age lifestyle of young American-born Sikh women who opt to stay single until they meet the right guy and not just any guy.

I close my ears and realize that I’ll wait. I’ll wait for THE minority of a minority within a minority who will understand and appreciate my quirks, my heart, my soul - and open himself up to allow me to do the same.

August 16, 2011

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