Between The Squiggles

Day 9 of writing-something-random-just-to-see-if-I-can-do-it-without-getting-self-conscious

A lot of the praise I’ve received in life may not have been entirely my own. Sometimes, I think it was borrowed, passed down because people already knew my sister. She was the golden child, the one who broke the mold, blazed the trail, and left big shoes to fill. Ivy League-bound before her A Levels were even over. And just like a shadow follows the sun, I was to surely follow in her footsteps. According to people.

Amongst these many people was a man named Ethan (alias), who runs a leadership center. Fifteen years ago, my sister worked for him during a summer internship, and I also happened to join his leadership program the year later as a student. Leadership is an abstract concept, and this man banked on that – he built an entire institute tapping into the insecurities, angst, and budding dreams of adolescents and young adults, claiming a lot of that could be solved through channeling your inner leader. As an adolescent, a “leadership program” sounded like something new, kind of like how every new-age yoga trend sounds to a lot of white people discovering it for the first time.

But we’re not here to talk about his program. Just to tell you he’s coming over for lunch tomorrow.

That he also happens to be a family friend, and so he and his wife are visiting tomorrow. I don’t know why I’m dreading it.

Maybe it’s the smug, self-satisfied smile he flashed every time he thought he dropped wisdom. Or the way he handpicked Ivy League grads to lead his programs while sidelining more competent staff who’d been there far longer. Or maybe it’s just because he’s going to ask for my update, and I’ll have to find some work-around way of saying I’m still figuring life out at 30. “Shameful,” I suppose, for someone who was always supposed to follow in her sister’s footsteps.

Well, maybe for all the leadership he taught me at a young age, it only made sense that I never followed in my sister’s footstep. I was am supposed to lead, remember? Yeah, so.