Kiwi POV

POV is an acronym for Point of View, not my surname. Though Pov could have given Kiwi,my first name, a touch of Dutch or French. The ending voiced labiodental fricative or simply ‘v’ would have promptly put me in Science and Arts Hall of Fame.

So I just frustratingly told you, I’m Kiwi not Pov. I have a simple rule: first, hear my point of view, then you are free to react. Write me an essay if you wish.

I’m pretty unextraordinary,or unextraordinarily pretty. Either way, I’m truly special. Orange, Apple, Peach, Sany, and naughty Nicole all have straight hair – mine has waves, freely forming, never flat, resembling my curvy body or my chubby cheeks or my kooky explorations or my mighty stunts. Pick one.

When I was three, I got a wristwatch as a gift -if my earliest memory doesn’t screw with me. I quietly named it ‘Sshsh‘. Aunt Jigs gave me this white plastic timepiece she perhaps bought for $1/10 pieces at ebay.  Except this would be historically wrong since I was born in 1989 while Ebay was founded on September 5, 1995.

I was born on September 11 according to my birth certificate, which Mom would repudiate and insist I celebrate my nameday on May 11th because that’s my real birthday. I cannot argue with the womb owner, can I? Had she told me I was found in our own garage, I wouldn’t disagree, although it would be outright ridiculous because 1. we never owned a garage, and 2. putting one of us for adoption would really ease her plight.

Now back to the fascinating watch, which I happened to stare at all my waking, unblinking hours. Love at first sight, only it’s toward an object that couldn’t glare back. One night, I let my guard down. I succumbed to sleep. As you’ve predicted, my treasured timepiece was gone when I woke up. The feeling of nothing on my wrist hurt my chest. No strap wrapping my wrist. No sticky plastic. No tic. No tac.

My vision blurred. My heartbeat raced. Draining all air from my tiny lungs, I allowed a scream louder, clearer, more strident than Mojaru’s (see footnote): “Who took my watch!”

Those were my first four words – a valid sentence. I didn’t talk till I was three. And it had to be to declare a grenade.

My aunt’s house might have not been ablazed while I lingered there, nonetheless, after that fateful event, I just couldn’t stop making problems for others to solve, puzzles for prodigies to piece together, little crimes for unreal cops to punish.

I didn’t plan to mess with my aunt’s jalousie window. I was just not as incurious or well-bred as my siblings who didn’t mind why a window has parallel glass, or glasses. More, not one. So I pushed one glass, obviously breaking it, and about to move another when my mom came to stop and strike my left hand. My first taste of cruelty. That day, I painfully learned to stay away from stuff my siblings find uninteresting.

I tried to grow up just like them: well-adjusted. Apple, especially. She just knows how the world works and she spins it on her palm like a wicked wonderwoman. No offense, Marvel. You made the best Ironman.

Footnote: Mojaru is the youngest sibling of Mojacko. Come, on, you must know him.