by Asya Mukhamedrakhimova
MKH digital plubication © 2025
by Asya Mkh
Category Life
Published December 8, 2024
The Sordid Tale of the Lonely Liberal Daughter

Young Woman in an Interior, by Jacob Vrel

Disclaimer: If my family is reading this, know I love you all, but sometimes being the only woke family member in a developing country takes its toll. And what is storytelling if not creative trauma dumping?

Long after our time, the winds will tell the tale of the lonely older daughter sitting at the table with her slightly more conservative parents, channelling her inner human rights lawyer. She has seen the world and, in her travels, learned the stories of different cultures. She has witnessed the truth of diversity and the importance of acceptance. After traveling around the globe, she returned home to break bread with her creators. The same people that sent her, kicking and screaming, on a journey to the foreign lands when she was but fourteen years young now looked at her in fear of what they had created. Knowing that the battle would be lost before it even began, the daughter sharpened her sword regardless, filling her phone with factual proof of her arguments to build a stronger case. She flew to her homeland on the back of a steel eagle, with a flight connection in Istanbul, filled with anticipation and anxiety, knowing that she would spend the next twenty days biting her tongue until it bled. As the years passed, the daughter grew in wisdom and began to understand that not every battle could be won, yet the war needed to be fought. Such is the way of the world.

On lonely nights, she gathered other fighters, and with a glass of white wine, they laid down their swords to exchange battlefield stories. ‘I had to explain what Pansexual means to my grandma,’ one would exclaim. ‘I spent an hour trying to prove to my father that his comment about a government official he saw on TV was racially insensitive,’ another would respond. As the moon shone brighter in the dark blue sky, the battle cries grew stronger, creating a melody that carried the frustration of older daughters at dinner tables around the world.

The birds sang their morning song, welcoming the rising sun as the daughter awoke from her sleep. With her eyes wide open and a whisper of a hangover reminding her of a night spent exchanging tales of war, she descended the steps to take her rightful place on the battleground, also known as the breakfast table. She looked for no fight. She merely wanted to taste the sweet nectar of her morning matcha and revel in pleasant conversations. Yet the fight waits for no woman. Her mother drew first blood by sharing inaccurate facts about a famous celebrity or athlete that she had heard from a friend of a friend. The daughter, without taking a second to compose her crumbled mind, responded with a wave of factual information and proof of that information that she had gathered long before their swords met on the field. At that moment, the truth prevailed over strange and random conspiracy theories that boomers in developing countries get out of thin air and decide to believe in. The mother, now with full knowledge of the facts, turned to the daughter and said those sweet words that symbolised a rare victory of the young warrior: “You are right.” These words carried a sweet glimpse of hope for a better tomorrow.

Not all of the daughter’s battles ended in triumph. Some days, while trying to provide helpful facts and figures on recent issues in the world to her father, she would receive a swift “Okay, I get it, just stop talking about it” in return. She doubted whether the stories she shared would make any difference in the long run, yet she understood it was better to retreat and live to fight another day. She often wanted not to speak again, accept her fate, and sit silently. Yet she knew she could not. The inability to stay silent was her burden to bear. During big family feasts, when one of the distant aunts would say something completely outrageous, all the eyes of the daughter’s immediate family would turn to her in anticipation of resistance. The daughter, wise enough to pick her battles, would subtly roll her eyes and seek solace in the quiet safety of her metal cocoon.

The tragedy of this tale is that the daughter did not want to carry on fighting. She wanted to enjoy a good meal and a fine drink and casually converse with her family. Yet every time a touching subject was brought up, she wondered if she could stand by her morals if she remained silent in the face of unfairness. Though she didn’t want to be a constant source of annoyance, she couldn’t help herself. In her wildest dreams, she hoped to change the mindsets of people who had grown up in a different environment for half a century and, through no fault of their own, lacked access to the evolving social structures outside their home country. Alas, this was not always the way. She wondered if the battle was even worth fighting. After all, her creators were good people, people who had done no wrong and were simply basing their knowledge on the information given to them by their surroundings.

She took pride in every battle she won. Every lesson she taught that was remembered and then used to modify and improve an approach towards a subject brought a smile to her face. To the credit of her opponents, there were times when they were open to learning. In those rare times, the battle stopped, and peace took over the lands. A treaty was often discussed, stipulating that the daughter would only enter a battle when all peaceful options were exhausted. The daughter knew there was a chance that even her sword, which has seen many winters, would one day be broken by her own children, educating her on the new ways of the world. She feared that day and hoped she’d stay strong in her efforts to educate herself, ensuring it never came. She also sometimes feared the day she would have children of her own in general, but that is a tale for another time.

This tale might sound familiar. To those daughters whose battle cries echo on cold, dark nights: you are not alone. I know the road seems long and the losses are countless, but to carry the burden of an older daughter is to guide your family towards a path of tolerance and understanding (amongst other responsibilities that we randomly get and are expected to take on without hesitation). Let’s fight the good fight and share our battle trauma over a glass of wine (or tequila, if the vibes are right).

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