what is love?

what is love but a fantasy? What is love but an illusion created by society? What is love when the ones closest to you cannot reciprocate? What is love when your mother calls you a prostitute, a whore, a slut. When she kicks you out for falling in love? When cultures clash and life happens and she doesn’t understand? When you are the first to graduate in the entire family and she doesn’t care? “don’t do it for me, do it for yourself,” she says. What is love when her culture teaches her not to value education because tradition dictates a womyn can’t fall in love with those whom don’t belong to that culture? When her experiences dictate to put guilt upon her two daughters that love is a taboo, that they are dirty if they even think about it? What is love when they try so hard to make her proud and all she thinks about is money and maintaining that overpowering control, called pride and indifference? What is love when your mother calls you trash, shit, and worse, nothing? When she disowns you and throws you out of her heart? What is love when the one who is supposed to give you unconditional love and love you for who you are does not do that because it is a cycle that is being repeated generation after generation. When she herself didn’t grow up being loved by her mother because there was no “time” for that when she had mouths to feed? What is love when at age 16 she flees to look for love and for a better life and she gets raped? Twice? Abandoning her mother, who despite the lack of love, she would die for?
Yes I know her story. I know their stories, of love, or the lack thereof. I was born because of her loneliness. She thought it was going to work out. less than 2 years. They fought hasta sacarse la sangre. The blood flowed like her tears, but her pride was all she had. She grew strong , ever since her mother knocked her out cold and she fainted and fell to the ground. She grew stronger when they forced her virginity out. She grew even stronger when she fought his machismo and won her dignity, but lost the one she loved. As the years progressed, this strength has turned into remorse, into jealousy, into a hunger for manipulation. This sweet girl who all she wanted was to be loved couldn’t even get that, at any stage in her life. She has turned into the shadow of depression, where she does not allow herself to comprehend and support her two beautiful, strong, independent, educated daughters. Time is ticking. It’s wasting away. She is losing power. She is falling deeper and deeper into an enveloping remorse that doesn’t let her breathe. There is so much pressure. So much pain. So much hunger…. For love. For companionship. For understanding. For nourishment. For alleviation.
And here I am in the middle. Dodging the bullets. Como una espada contra la pared. Sin poder decidir. Sin poder hacer nada porque no se trata de una persona. Se trata de una cultura entera donde algunas veces el amor es secundario, y el sobrevivir lo lleva a uno a olvidarse de que existe el amor. When one must forget about love, and forget about maintaining that strong connection with the only two people you have. This is a story about a sister who is tired of showing love to her mother and trying to make her feel proud, and yet only receives dirty words in return. This is a story about a mother who never grew up feeling true love, not from her mother, not from the one she thought she loved, and not from herself. This is a story about a daughter who remains silenced and retains it all. In here and in here. And never speaks a word and only occasionally cries in silence to herself. Ashamed. Guilty. Powerless and inferior. Who always asks herself, what is love but a fantasy? And illusion created by society? A lie?
As this story continues, more questions are asked than answered as she strolls along the sidewalks of her life and the corners of her mind. As she struggles to break free from this emotional trend that consumes her everyday and prevents her from stepping out of that comfort zone… because guilt is all she can feel.