bi chamd hairgui

Hi, tslm!

Que here to review your piece today.

I want to start off with the beginning:

Do you like movies? What genre do you like?

I always loved romantic movies. I always wished for meeting my soulmate who will turn my world for the better. Isn't that what all small girls want?

Since your work is classed as an "essay," I wasn't quite sure what I was stepping into! Was that opening question directed at the reader? At the narrator?

But, as I read on, the structure of your work became a lot clearer, so I think that opening works well. It's intriguing.

I also really enjoy how you carry the movie metaphor throughout the piece. Having your own eyes be the cameras following you throughout your life is a really interesting concept!

One suggestion I have about that is keeping that imagery firm through the end. I enjoy how you keep referencing the initial analogy, but it mostly turns into the "script" and "rewriting" it. That feels to me more like writing than filming, and I think it would be cool to see some more of the unique movie-like imagery.

For example, in this paragraph:

I only saw you as a plain blank canvas I could color as I wished.

I really like that idea! But you could also tie it into the movie theme by saying something like, "I only saw you as an actor I could direct as I wished." It could be an interesting concept to keep playing with throughout the narrative.

Something else I really liked about your story was the turn it takes. You sort of set the readers up with this part:

I was too busy trying to force myself into liking your smell that made me uncomfortable, that I did not notice how we were not playing in the story I wrote for us.

That really did it for me because with the narrator forcing her(?)self to like this person, I thought that they would be the abuser when the topic came up. I thought that the story would repeat in that the narrator walks into an abusive situation again -- but instead, you show that the narrator has actually recreated that situation.

Why did you talk, think and act like my mother?

Victims choose their abusers.

You made me talk, think and act like my father.

Abused ones become abusers.

These little lines are the turning point in this story. I'm not sure about victims choosing their abusers, but this is the moment when you show the results of the narrator's mentality and what their relationship becomes.

It's interesting that the readers don't see much of the narrator's relationship. We only know the narrator's feelings toward the romantic interest, and these few things:

You showed me your secret place and let it become ours. And there I taught you how to say “i love you” in my mother language.

You smiled and repeated “bi chamd hairtai”.

You started to bring out the worst out of me.

We don't really see what that worst looks like, or the other person's reaction to it. Instead, those scenes are substituted with moments between the narrator's parents. In some ways, this makes the story more powerful: since readers don't actually know what the narrator and their partner are like, they can only assume that it's like the parents' relationship, which is what we can see. That really pushes the point that the narrator is recreating their story, and it's really interesting.

So, I tried to rewrite their story. I wanted to make myself love you and treat you right. I wanted to prove myself that I am better than them. That I am different from them. I put my selfishness before our happiness.

In the end it was you who rewrote it.

You left me.

I hated you.

For a long time I did not realize that you gave me the best ending you could have.

You didn't let me become my father.

Bi chamd hairtai.

I liked the ending a lot. The narrator is self-aware, and tries to change, but forcing it doesn't work. Instead, the partner is the one who finds a way out. I really appreciate the narrator's ultimate realization that the partner did the right thing, and eventually they can say I love you.

I do think I got a few mixed messages, though. I think on the one hand, the narrator is clearly forcing themselves to like the partner, but instead it is making them abusive. However, there are several instances where it seems like the partner is just as responsible:

What I did not expect is for you to start resembling one of the two people that made me want to escape my world in the first place. If I wasn't so blind and saw you instead of who I wanted you to be, would I realize that you are like my abuser?

You made me talk, think and act like my father.

You started to bring out the worst out of me. Instead of teaching me how to say “i love you” in your love language, you were teaching how my father felt when he wanted to hit my mother.

I guess my point is that the narrator is placing blame on the partner for being just as abusive and "making" them be some way. Even though they try to escape, it is only the partner who can escape. It feels like there is something here about freedom and change that doesn't quite get fully formed. It would be interesting if you went even further into it and made it clearer that both parties are responsible, or, if that's not the case, that the narrator can't really blame their partner. Or, maybe neither is really responsible, only history? Anyway, would be interesting to see more in this area.

Overall, very sad but really well written in the way you turned the story around. I thought the ending was well-suited in the way it had some forgiveness and change in it.

I also just wanted to highlight a couple of phrases I really enjoyed:

It was the dirtiest and purest love I saw in my life.

How can you blame fish for not knowing how to fly?

I was not in love with you. But I wanted to be.

I particularly liked these parts because in a single sentence (or two!), you laid out the situation really clearly and poignantly.

Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about anything I wrote! As always, you're welcome to take or leave anything I suggested.

Have a lovely day!

-Q

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!

First Impression: Well this was quite the little tale. I love the way you've used the title beautifully in those two pivotal moments and the way you construct it from naive little girl to adult who realizes her mistakes and understands where she really stands in life.

Anyway let's get right to it,

Do you like movies? What genre do you like?

I always loved romantic movies. I always wished for meeting my soulmate who will turn my world for the better. Isn't that what all small girls want?

Well, that wish never changed even after growing up.

We all play main characters in our lives. Instead of the expensive camera, you are followed by your eyes and instead of the thousands or millions of people watching your story, you are the only one who has the keys to the theater.

Well this is a lovely little start. Truly just addressing those little dreams that everyone tends to have in their younger age and just it a beautiful little tinge of nostalgia there to get things started off.

But I hated the script that I was given to act in.

So, I wrote my own script and all I needed was that person, who will make my world turn colorful.

Then I met you. I would like to give a detailed description of how you looked that day and admire your beauty as it deserves. But how could I? I never tried to look at what's behind your eyes. I only saw you as a plain blank canvas I could color as I wished.

And before I knew, your blue eyes started to get warmer when you saw me.

Ooh well this is quite the direction. We have both that little I'm really not happy with where this life is leading me moment which is a classic but we're interrupted just a little bit by some potential love there. Well this is quite the moment. Let's see where this is going.

I was too busy trying to force myself into liking your smell that made me uncomfortable, that I did not notice how we were not playing in the story I wrote for us.

You showed me your secret place and let it become ours. And there I taught you how to say “i love you” in my mother language.

You smiled and repeated “bi chamd hairtai”.

I was not in love with you. But I wanted to be. And that's what matters, right?

What I did not expect is for you to start resembling one of the two people that made me want to escape my world in the first place. If I wasn't so blind and saw you instead of who I wanted you to be, would I realize that you are like my abuser?

Well that definitely took a bit of a turn there but I think that ends up lining up better with the idea of the wrong script. I think its lovely the way you extend that metaphor upto this point here and really start to explore the direction of how relationships like that can go.

Why did you talk, think and act like my mother?

Victims choose their abusers.

You made me talk, think and act like my father.

Abused ones become abusers.

The realization that we were not making a new story, but replaying theirs shattered me.

You started to bring out the worst out of me. Instead of teaching me how to say “i love you” in your love language, you were teaching how my father felt when he wanted to hit my mother.

Don't get me wrong though. My parents loved each other. It was the dirtiest and purest love I saw in my life.

Well this is really touching on the horror of things like this quite well pointing out how broken that can be and how much it can in fact break someone. Of course now the addition of how the parents behave is really quite the line there. Its a powerful way of showing what a broken yet cobbled together relationship it is.

He would bruise her body, but he was the only one who listened to her when everyone acted deaf. She made him miserable, so much he wanted to disappear from this world, but she was also the only one who never gave up on him when everyone else left.

They loved each other and hated each other, like they loved and hated themselves.

How can you blame fish for not knowing how to fly?

So, I tried to rewrite their story. I wanted to make myself love you and treat you right. I wanted to prove myself that I am better than them. That I am different from them. I put my selfishness before our happiness.

In the end it was you who rewrote it.

Well that's quite a moment there. First of all seeing dysfunctional that parent's relationship even though it weirdly works out and now seeing how that compelled this person out of almost spite to want to do better even at somehow surviving in a broken relationship this person doesn't want. Its quite the ironic twist.

You left me.

I hated you.

For a long time I did not realize that you gave me the best ending you could have.

You didn't let me become my father.

Well that's an oddly wholesome ending there that in the end the person she chose while certainly not the one for her was at least not as ready as her to repeat history and did the tough but necessary thing in the moment so that once they get past it all they're both better off and free to maybe have actual good lives.

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

Overall: Overall I think you've done a wonderful job here with this. Its a beautiful little story and the theater analogy works out very well too. Its also quite a lovely little plot starting out hopeful and getting quite sad towards but ending on a true happy note in a sense that's still very realistic and powerful there.

As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.

Stay Safe
Kate