Why Hadn’t I Been Publishing On Medium?

There is/was an anime named Doraemon. I had started watching that anime when I was just a kid, maybe in 2nd or 3rd grade. I liked that anime very much but, unfortunately, it wasn’t very much favored in my family because of a few reasons. We were therefore not allowed to watch that anime. We weren’t restricted from watching that anime forever, of course, we could watch it sometimes.

As time went by, as I grew up, I grew distant from that anime, and at one point in time, I completely stopped watching it. But then, a remarkable incident occurred. An incident that I will never ever forget! The incident: it was 2019, the month was November, and I was 13 years old. I and my brother were together making our bed before going to sleep at night, while I was doing the work, my brother was on the phone, on YouTube (he was there temporarily, okay, he later came to help just as a good brother!) He suddenly exclaimed, “Hey, Nobita and Shizuka (two protagonists of Doraemon) got married!”

When the news reached my ears, it hit my heart. In fact, there wasn’t any such thing about the movie that did not hit me. (And yes, “thing” it is because that’s the only way I found to express myself.) “What!” I said in a fainting voice
‘Stand by Me Doraemon 2’ is coming! Nobita has grown up! Nobita and Shizuka got married!” said my brother in excitement, and I lost my words. Because I got emotional. And another feeling which accompanied me was ‘guilt’.

The ones who love Doraemon or at least like it very much will be able to understand why were my reactions (except the guilt) like that. To understand why I got emotional, you need to first understand that there is a chain of thoughts and feelings that made me emotional: Nobita had a childhood sweetheart named Shizuka; Nobita was a clumsy character, and if there was any boy who had all the unpleasant and disappointing characteristics in him, he would be Nobita!; Shizuka was an intelligent girl, she was, what you could call a ‘good girl’; it was difficult to conclude that Shizuka liked Nobita; there had been many rifts between these two characters; finally, in the movie, Nobita has grown up, and has married Shizuka. ‘Guilt’, why the guilt? Because, as I said, that I had stopped watching Doraemon, left the anime long back.

I suddenly started feeling a strong urge of watching that movie, as a result. But I was scared, I felt that Doraemon is a cartoon for kids. Therefore, the movie will also be for kids. And then, I concluded that it is not a movie for teenagers like me and that it will be a shame if I watch it. Therefore, that urge started getting suppressed. However, I felt that there is something with this.

That urge of watching the movie stayed in me, but it was never so strong that I could prioritize watching it over my other shows. So, the urge was there, the action wasn’t. Then, one day, the urge was gone, I never even discerned it and it didn’t even bother me.

Time passed by again, and again something happened one day. Only this time, a game-changing incident occurred. After my academic studies get over at somewhere around 20:45, I begin with my studies. And I always listen to music whenever I am studying, or writing. Hence, I went to YouTube and when I scrolled down for songs, I find a song named ‘Niji’. It was a song from ‘Stand By Me Doraemon 2'. My expression was: “Oh! Stand by Me… has songs.” When I looked at the picture of the video, I felt that it is a very grave and emotional song. And because I underestimated the movie, my expression was contemptuous. I looked at it for some time and then I played the song.

Again, an urge. This time, of crying. I wanted to cry heavily from the time when the song didn’t even start, just by looking at that black screen at the start of the video. But, I was ashamed. Feelings of ‘kid’s anime’, ‘kid’s cartoon’, etc came rushing to my mind, and my mind curtly started saying to me not to cry, there was nothing to cry about. I felt myself to be the weirdest and the strangest person you could meet who cries watching ‘kid’s anime’ song and does so when the singer hasn’t even started singing.

I had a crying urge the whole video. I had feelings after watching the video: I was touched, I felt bad at the marriage of Nobita and Shizuka because I thought that now the anime is over, Nobita and Shizuka have left me, the anime has left me, I regretted that I had stopped watching the anime over time, (I had some positive feelings too), however, I just won’t accept it! Since for me, all these feelings originated from content that I thought to be inappropriate for my age.
Then, my brother came out of the toilet, and I said to him, “Hey, Mith, come here, I want to make you listen to a song”
“Ha? Alright,” he replied.
He then came, I gave him an earpiece, I had one, and I played the song. I accepted, however, that the song was very good, so when I played it the second time I was completely engrossed in the tune.

In the engrossment, I thought that what if my brother was crying watching the video and listening to the song. I said to myself that, no, this cannot happen, and with a weak feeling that he would be crying, I turned my head up to see what was the case! His eyes had turned red. And yes, he was crying. That hit me hard. I did not cry thinking it was a “kids’ song”, then how come my brother was crying?

I was very much broken down after realizing this. I was drained out, and in such a state, I went back to writing my blog post. That blog post needed more editing and I just could not do it. Being completely fed up, I just rushed up to the publish button, added any tags that came into my mind, didn’t care if I wrote it right or wrong, and I finally published it.

After listening to the song I decided to watch the movie Stand By Me… so that I could cry out and remove my pent-up feelings. According to my routine, I was free to watch the movie on the Saturday of the week and I had to wait for three days. And so I did, waited for three days with a messed up heart!

My Saturday finally came, I went to a website, and started watching the movie. Oh, What a feeling that was! I was feeling so very excited and happy as I watched the movie! It took me back to my old times! I felt that I am again meeting the characters: Nobita, Shizuka, Doraemon, and several others!

It took me two days to complete the movie. On the first day, I watched some scenes that made me cry, but they would only well my eyes up or I would cry a driblet or two. The next day, the case was moreover the same. I wanted to cry to the point where all of my feelings were out, but the movie couldn’t give that hard a push. I, therefore, waited for the song (Niji) that would come up at the end. I thought, that, only the song could make me feel light. However, it couldn’t.

Thoughts of criticism came to my mind about the movie, that I never felt, nor I ever wanted, but I know somewhere deep down in my heart there was dissatisfaction because I couldn’t cry.

I was in depression for a long time. Because I felt that Nobita, Shizuka, and the “Doraemon” anime had left me. I was touched by the way they drew the child Shizuka, she was so beautiful! I felt sad that Nobita and Shizuka got married because I thought that now the anime was over, they had left me!

And because of all of this, my whole routine got scattered. I had no will to read, write, or do things that are tough to do.