Dad, Dogs and Daughter

Disclaimer: They say sharing with strangers helps.

She was not exceptional, neither an average.Life always gave her intellectual opportunities in terms of best schools, best professors.

Born to an unsuccessfully successful extraordinary father, she grew up with comparison, not with the siblings but with her own father.She threw out her pink ballerina shoes and tried to fit in the brown shoes he had chosen for her.His rules, his prescriptions- she embraced all the emotional blisters of the psychologically ill-fitted shoes.All she wanted was to please him and to be praised in return.Like a little dog who had given the behavior she always waited for him to dole out some “daddy-words”.But, for him she never arrived, there was always another hill to climb, one another mountain to conquer.Au contraire, family dogs- George and Ronald would get the more than enthusiastic praise for their little non-significant tricks every time. Nonetheless, she continued quietly.

Time flew and here she stands, confident enough to make her own decisions.

The other day she heard the snippets of conversation.

“You should be proud of her.”

“Yeah, BUT…” It was a reluctant admittance from his side with a big clause attached to it.

Once again she failed to live up to his expectation.The hard work she had put on all these years became meaningless.

The world applauds her achievements, but in her world it was never appreciated.She is moving to a different intellectual direction, and he is less willing to accept it.He has something else planned for her.She is confident, but still she could not get out of the moral and psychological dilemma of defying her father.She feels worthless at this point of life.Simply worthless!