The long search for Steeze.
Photo from Unsplash.
Take 1: Steeze. The first time I heard it, I was convinced that some content person (who influences people) had left Slovakia and was trying to talk about a friend of theirs named Steve. But they left the V behind and America nodded understandingly and gave them a Z instead, so they ended up saying Steeze. But that wasn't the case it seemed, because everyone was trying to, or already had this "Steeze" person. I wondered who he was, the steeze guy, and how to get him. So I began my search on the one place every sensible twenty-in-something year old begins, Google.
Take 2: I got on Google and searched for "Steeze". Google shook its search bar at me and showed me informal US results for "steez". I shook my head in bewilderment of what the world was becoming but decided to read on anyway. It spoke of some sort of way of doing things in a stylish, fashionable way. I frowned at it the way our parents frowned at us like rags when they saw something that resembled sags with our trousers.
Take 3: I tried searching for Steve from Slovakia on the internet, but I couldn't seem to find him, only the Steve that used to have Jobbs. I nodded in "the Internet isn't the best place to search for people''. But I didn't have a fortune-teller ball, and wanted lists aren't exactly popular, now that everyone has a most wanted mobile.
Take 4: I decided that even Google couldn't be trusted anymore. It has been compromised. Some tech person who couldn't trek 3 miles was now deciding what we saw on our search engines, I couldn't make sense of it. I shook my head in the 70s and affirmed that the world was really coming to an end.
Take 5: I decided to embark on a tour across the social media platforms in search of this steez plague, and it turned out it was worse than I thought. There were people on that tweeting bird app that spoke about refusing to beg at gun points for their lives or running out of houses on fire because of “Steez”. Everybody coats vulnerability behind jokes and humour these days, but I've seen our weaknesses and evil minds take full advantage of this too. I once lost someone I loved because I wanted to look cool, because they said it was stylish to get revenge while it was cold. Or something like that. And I did like cold drinks too. In my defence.
Take 6: Turns out even as I cursed the youth around the world for having a steez by their side, he had been standing close to me the entire time. He just changed his name this time around. But he had been around from the beginning. We just called him by a different name. And he seemed to like style these days too. Seems he got motivated by The Devil Wears Prada movie.
Take 7: Not all steez is bad, but I've heard it said before (by Fredrik Backman) that of all human weaknesses, the strongest of all, is pride.
Take 8: Turns out I wasn't so different after all. I probably just wanted to take off Steez's clothes more than the rest and I saw the same old, same old from the garden standing there. Changing clothes like we've been changing with time. Or changing with our fears. And I wondered how many of us, for the sake of looking cool and stylish, lost something, someone we loved, couldn't get a job done properly? Couldn't say sorry or an I love you, when we knew we'd never see them again? Or get that chance?
Take 9: I'm learning that Steez doesn't have to follow me everywhere now, since I can't bloody get rid of him. It. I leave it in my room sometimes, or at the gate. Sometimes the people I love are reason enough not to tag him along, but sometimes he sneaks his way in nonetheless, and I have to drag him all the way back outside and shake my hands at him and try not to swear. But it's hard, especially because, as it turns out, there's a lot of Steez flying around.
Take 10: I decided after a general meeting with the selves of me, that it was probably best to get myself a Steez-blindfolder.
