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Abstract

e delivery room, Mom, exhausted, asks for a cesarean. Because of my birth, she cannot eat nor drink. The doctors refuse and the pushing starts again.9:50 pm, I finally see the world. But at what cost?Mom does not have time to hold me in her arms, I’m taken away from her. The doctors fear that I swallowed the amniotic liquid. Fortunately, the fear was just that, a fear. And I’m able to meet Dad for the first time. But, because this is a but story, the end of our troubles is not there yet. Mom is still inside, not for hours, but for days long. Anemia, the doctors say. It’s bad, her hemoglobin level is at a mere five. First blood bag, the hemoglobin level rises to seven.The hope is there.Second blood bag, convulsions. Fingers are crossed. The doctors persist and, let’s call it a miracle, mommy and baby can finally see each other.<h2 id="f0f7">It’s all about feelings</h2>For some of us, the process of giving birth is rarely perfect. In the best scenarios, while our moms are pushing every gut of their belly to let us out, our fathers are forced to watch, doing their best to appease a pain they will never know. In the slap of a finger, light can cede his place to darkness. On a single day, we can feel all kinds of emotions, stress, fear, panic. But also positive ones.That first gaze on our half closed eyes, that first poke on our cheeks, the warmth of our frail little bodies.That is perfection, my kind of perfection. Those little moments where we can appreciate life.<h2 id="86ed">My First Words</h2>Follow me, let’s go a few years later, July 2007: My very first love, or as I like to call it, my first words. It’s a story about love: an all too controversial subject, tackled far too many times by far too many people.<figure id="c12c"><img src="https://cdn-images-1.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:800/0*_m93mA9X2DvbV-9W"><figcaption>Photo by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@flo_karr?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Flo Karr</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Unsplash</a></figcaption></figure>I would love to tell you how tall she was, how the silk of her hair slithered on my hands, how the blue of her eyes was as deep as the ocean. I would love to describe the roundness of her curves, the thin shape of her waist, and her sensual swaying. I would love to let you watch the radiance of her eyes, the ruby color of her lips, and let you melt into the warmth of her smile. I would love to tell you that I had a rose in my hand, that I was the perfect gentleman, funny, smiling, and caring.The truth is far from it.It’s my second summer in Canada, I remember that day as if it was yesterday: The sun is high in the sky, most kids my age are playing outside. I’m watching them through my window, two minutes, I go back to my bed, playing video games.Knock knock.My father wants me to go out with them. He and my stepmother are going to one of their friend’s place on the other side of the city. It’s far, it’s hot, I’m playing my game and you know what? I don’t even know them, No I’ll stay, you go. I’ll do a quick run by the park later.<p

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id="0359">Inside of me, I have no desire to stay home, it’s the opposite, I want to go out. But, people I don’t know? I’m not one of those easy-going dudes, I’ll keep playing my game.My dad comes back, this time he does not ask. Get ready, we go in thirty minutes. I don’t know what to think, I’m excited at the idea of meeting new people, but I’m also afraid to talk to them. I sulk, I pout, I complain, I give in and I end up going all the same.<h2 id="2b4a">The trial starts</h2>The house is lively and the smell of food is pulling me in. My stepmother goes in, the noise starts, and voices begin to pop out left and right. Among them, there’s the one, my heart races. Stress and excitement take hold of me. but I’m curious, I want to see, I want to know.I go in, our eyes meet, the voice stops, my heart too.“Don’t you say hi?”Boom, boom, boom, my heart is beating again. The girl smiles, I’m feeling shy. Then, follow an equally weird series of moments: the looks we traded while I was trying to devour my dish as elegantly as possible — without much success, the little sister who took upon herself to be my shadow, the parent jokes and finally, that moment, the two of us, alone in the living room.The chitchats of fourteen years old kids are, let’s say, special. After a bunch of lame words nested on top of each other in the hope of lifting an already lame conversation, it is time to leave. More courageous than me, she takes my hand and writes her e-mail address — thank you Hotmail. That evening, I said my first words. But, that’s a whole different story.Was that moment perfect? No, believe me, I was there. And yet there’s nothing in the world that will make me want to change a single minute. Not the oil on my cheeks during the dinner, not even all the lame words I kept saying, Well, I may be exaggerating a little on that last point.From the day I was born to the day I’m writing those lines, I lived a whole lot of stories as sad and as clumsy as these. But they all were authentic and deeply loaded with emotions. Feelings that I felt with all my heart. I don’t define them as perfect, because that word has already been used and tainted. No, those feelings and those moments are far from perfection, well above, they are mine.I could keep going and tell you about those five minutes of February 2010, five minutes of a day like all others, the day I met her, an encounter where I still wonder if it should have happened. I could tell you about that night at the beach, to what it means to be a unique child, to the feeling of being alone in a crowd or even of my demons. But I think you get it, the point of this story is to show you that instead of trying to be perfect as society intends us to be, learning to know and to accept ourselves is a more noble goal.<blockquote id="e10d">Let’s not be fooled, perfection is not to be blamed, it’s how society imposes it to us that is. On the contrary, I do think that every human on the earth and beyond should aspire to it. Just, let’s not put upon others our ideals and preconceived ideas as the rule that leads the world.</blockquote>We first need to be perfect for ourselves.</article></body>

A Story About Perfection

And why it’s not what we think it is.

Perfection is the flawless state where everything is exactly right. It’s the absence of flaws and defects, it’s the embodiment of brightness.

That’s what you’ll find by clicking a few links online. While I do believe that sentence is true, I also believe it’s false. Simply, I think it’s not accurate. You see, even perfection has boundaries. Limits that holds it to even greater heights. To be perfect you have to play in a field, and the referee is society. There are rules you have to obey, yellow cards for free spirits and red ones for outcasts. Even the most gifted among us struggle to score a single goal. And yet we keep going for it, no matter how taxing that number 10 is.

What if perfection was not about scoring the next goal, but simply about finding the strength to move on an even greater field? That of life.

Without all those rules, we would allow ourselves to disappoint, but we would also give us the chance to go beyond, to be unpredictable, and to wow. May it be good or bad, we would give ourselves the chance to grow, to reach summits and heights that only exist in our dreams. And most of all, we would learn the true essence of the L word.

Let me tell you a story, one that has no end. Well, at least for now. But like every story, it does have a beginning. That of the day I was born. I remember very little of it. So. we’re going to see it through the eyes of my parents.

It all started an April 2nd, a Friday. I would love to tell you how bright the sun was, burning high in the sky. I would love to tell you that my first gaze was upon the eyes of my Mom, followed by a tiny cry, then the eyes of my Dad. I would love to tell you that everything was fine, that my Mom didn’t suffer, and how perfect a day it was. The truth is far from it.

I never Liked Hospitals

Two in the morning, the water broke. The neighbors rush to our help and call a taxi, one way to the hospital, I’m about to be born. An hour later, the first contraction starts. Mom is pushing, pushing, and pushing, but the door is not ready to let me out just yet. Two, five, ten, sixteen hours after, I’m still in there, knocking without an answer.

Hang in there, little baby.

The doctors move Mom to a more secluded room so she won’t see the other women that came after her, holding their babies before her. In the meantime, Dad is in the waiting hall for a good seventeen hours now, worried and tired. In the delivery room, Mom, exhausted, asks for a cesarean. Because of my birth, she cannot eat nor drink. The doctors refuse and the pushing starts again.

9:50 pm, I finally see the world. But at what cost?

Mom does not have time to hold me in her arms, I’m taken away from her. The doctors fear that I swallowed the amniotic liquid. Fortunately, the fear was just that, a fear. And I’m able to meet Dad for the first time. But, because this is a but story, the end of our troubles is not there yet. Mom is still inside, not for hours, but for days long. Anemia, the doctors say. It’s bad, her hemoglobin level is at a mere five. First blood bag, the hemoglobin level rises to seven.

The hope is there.

Second blood bag, convulsions. Fingers are crossed. The doctors persist and, let’s call it a miracle, mommy and baby can finally see each other.

It’s all about feelings

For some of us, the process of giving birth is rarely perfect. In the best scenarios, while our moms are pushing every gut of their belly to let us out, our fathers are forced to watch, doing their best to appease a pain they will never know. In the slap of a finger, light can cede his place to darkness. On a single day, we can feel all kinds of emotions, stress, fear, panic. But also positive ones.

That first gaze on our half closed eyes, that first poke on our cheeks, the warmth of our frail little bodies.

That is perfection, my kind of perfection. Those little moments where we can appreciate life.

My First Words

Follow me, let’s go a few years later, July 2007: My very first love, or as I like to call it, my first words. It’s a story about love: an all too controversial subject, tackled far too many times by far too many people.

I would love to tell you how tall she was, how the silk of her hair slithered on my hands, how the blue of her eyes was as deep as the ocean. I would love to describe the roundness of her curves, the thin shape of her waist, and her sensual swaying. I would love to let you watch the radiance of her eyes, the ruby color of her lips, and let you melt into the warmth of her smile. I would love to tell you that I had a rose in my hand, that I was the perfect gentleman, funny, smiling, and caring.

The truth is far from it.

It’s my second summer in Canada, I remember that day as if it was yesterday: The sun is high in the sky, most kids my age are playing outside. I’m watching them through my window, two minutes, I go back to my bed, playing video games.

Knock knock.

My father wants me to go out with them. He and my stepmother are going to one of their friend’s place on the other side of the city. It’s far, it’s hot, I’m playing my game and you know what? I don’t even know them, No I’ll stay, you go. I’ll do a quick run by the park later.

Inside of me, I have no desire to stay home, it’s the opposite, I want to go out. But, people I don’t know? I’m not one of those easy-going dudes, I’ll keep playing my game.

My dad comes back, this time he does not ask. Get ready, we go in thirty minutes. I don’t know what to think, I’m excited at the idea of meeting new people, but I’m also afraid to talk to them. I sulk, I pout, I complain, I give in and I end up going all the same.

The trial starts

The house is lively and the smell of food is pulling me in. My stepmother goes in, the noise starts, and voices begin to pop out left and right. Among them, there’s the one, my heart races. Stress and excitement take hold of me. but I’m curious, I want to see, I want to know.

I go in, our eyes meet, the voice stops, my heart too.

“Don’t you say hi?”

Boom, boom, boom, my heart is beating again. The girl smiles, I’m feeling shy. Then, follow an equally weird series of moments: the looks we traded while I was trying to devour my dish as elegantly as possible — without much success, the little sister who took upon herself to be my shadow, the parent jokes and finally, that moment, the two of us, alone in the living room.

The chitchats of fourteen years old kids are, let’s say, special. After a bunch of lame words nested on top of each other in the hope of lifting an already lame conversation, it is time to leave. More courageous than me, she takes my hand and writes her e-mail address — thank you Hotmail. That evening, I said my first words. But, that’s a whole different story.

Was that moment perfect? No, believe me, I was there. And yet there’s nothing in the world that will make me want to change a single minute. Not the oil on my cheeks during the dinner, not even all the lame words I kept saying, Well, I may be exaggerating a little on that last point.

From the day I was born to the day I’m writing those lines, I lived a whole lot of stories as sad and as clumsy as these. But they all were authentic and deeply loaded with emotions. Feelings that I felt with all my heart. I don’t define them as perfect, because that word has already been used and tainted. No, those feelings and those moments are far from perfection, well above, they are mine.

I could keep going and tell you about those five minutes of February 2010, five minutes of a day like all others, the day I met her, an encounter where I still wonder if it should have happened. I could tell you about that night at the beach, to what it means to be a unique child, to the feeling of being alone in a crowd or even of my demons. But I think you get it, the point of this story is to show you that instead of trying to be perfect as society intends us to be, learning to know and to accept ourselves is a more noble goal.

Let’s not be fooled, perfection is not to be blamed, it’s how society imposes it to us that is. On the contrary, I do think that every human on the earth and beyond should aspire to it. Just, let’s not put upon others our ideals and preconceived ideas as the rule that leads the world.

We first need to be perfect for ourselves.