Member-only story
About Bearing the Unbearable
(And how the unbearable exists because we let it)
On the train
I was sitting on a train on my way to the office, going about my daily routine of saying good morning and smiling to the auntie and uncle on either side of me, all three of us shuffling a little uncomfortably, and as soon as I settled down, I started flipping through the headlines on my phone, and somewhere between Haw Par Villa and Pasir Panjang stations, I must have seen an article about the conditions that must be met for something to justifiably be called genocide, and I thought as if that matters, when suffering is unbearable and life is hell, who cares about genocide-blemocide, and I saw the uncle to my right, no, my brother, had put his phone down and his eyes were now fixed on the screen of my phone, and I distinctly remember thinking, why is he staring so blankly at my screen, and then my brain allowed me to connect, and suddenly I saw.
On the screen in my hand was a photo of a grandmother with a child. No, I will not share her photo with you. A grandmother and a child. A girl, I think. I will never share this horrible but sacred image with you because it is forever etched in my heart, and I’m sure the next-to-me-on-the-train brother has it too, and I never want to see it again. A grandmother with a girl. I will never forget what I…
