It was back in 2013, 2014 when I first saw the Avengers. Being a non-comic book fan, I did not understand the hype of having six different heroes together in one frame. The Iron Man movies which would repeat on a channel never made sense to me either. It was ‘Captain America: Winter Soldier’ which pulled me into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. For the longest time, Steve Rogers continued to be my favourite character and even after every single hate comment I have read against him, my views remain unchanged.
The real challenge came when ‘Civil War’ came out in 2016. Everybody had a side and after the movie released, Team Iron Man trended on AO3 like nothing ever. For someone who had not seen Iron Man movies up till this point, I began to lean towards the wonder that was Tony Stark. I re-watched the Avengers movies and saw the Iron Man movies in 2017 in one go.
Being a humanities student, I fell in love with Engineering. Robert Downey Jr. brought out a different side to the Tony Stark and I began wondering if I could take up science again after abandoning it. Steve Rogers would always remain my favourite character, but Tony Stark? Tony Stark became as real to me as anybody I could touch. I could imagine a man, so broken yet so strong, so vulnerable yet so brilliant and so wonderful. ‘Spiderman: Homecoming’ brought out another side of him, a caring trying to be mentor/father figure. By the time the announcement for ‘Infinity War’ came out, Tony Stark was becoming a very serious contender for my favourite character right beside Steve Rogers.
Scarlett Johansson is an exceptional actress and from ‘Iron Man 2’ to ‘Captain America: Winter Soldier’, she made us fall in love with the spy and assassin. Natasha Romanoff was an enigma, a woman who was strong and yet human. With ‘Age of Ultron’ and ‘Civil War’, we fell in love with the human who had slowly started to bring down her walls. It was impossible to hate a woman so tortured, yet so hopeful. Having seen her as a professional woman and a happy family member, it was impossible for someone to not shed one tear when she became teary-eyed at the start of ‘Endgame’. Her death, perhaps, was the most surprising and therefore, a sure tearjerker.
Any Marvel fan knows the story of ‘Infinity War’ and ‘Endgame’ wrecked us all. There were tears in ‘Infinity War’, but the end of ‘Endgame’? Now that was something.
Which brings me back to my title- How do you get over a death that’s reel?
The rational side of my mind continues to talk about how it’s all in the movies, how it’s all just stories just made up in our minds. The actor is alive, the essence is alive and people will love the Avengers throughout time.
Almost a week later, when the tears have stopped falling and every single mention doesn’t clench your heart, I decided to write this. They say the stories that we love always live with us and it’s true. But not all stories are happily ever after and those deaths of characters wreck us.
But what about us?
What about the generation that grew up with these characters?
What about the people who could feel the pain when he said “I am Iron Man” one last time and looked at Pepper Potts, saying her name before drifting off?
Where do we go on from here?
How do we move on from the deaths of reel characters that were never really there?
Others say, they were only characters, only stories. But then, they were the ones who proved to be there for us when no one else was. Two characters, so heroic yet so human, passed away.
One day, it will be fine. One day, we will be okay. But for now, how do we get over the death that’s reel and has yet managed to destroy us completely?

In the LGBTQ+ community, there are many identities. We all know the basic

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer.

However, see the little plus at the end? the ‘+’ sign? Yeah, it means that there are more identities that you might not know about.

Two identities were, people still have a hard time accepting them.

They say that they don’t exist.

Well, excuse you Mr and Ms and whatever pronouns you use, BUT PANSEXUALITY AND ASEXUALITY ARE REAL!!!

What is Pansexuality?

The sexual, romantic or emotional attraction to someone regardless of their sex or gender identity.

Yup, this is different from bisexuals. Bisexuals are merely interested in men AND women. Those are the two sexes and the gender identity they are attracted to. Pansexuals, on the other hand, are attracted to gender-fluid and many other gender identities in addition to the people identifying as Men and Women.

There is a serious difference, people.

And no, it DOES NOT mean that pansexuals will have sex with any’thing’. They will not have sex with children or animals because excuse you, they are not monsters. For the kind information, they fall in love with a person, a human irrespective of their gender identity.

And as for Asexuality, well, well, well!

The most common argument I have ever heard against this is: You ave never tried sex, how do you know whether you like it or not?

I am sorry, you have never tried drugs, how will you know whether you like it or not?

There is a thing known as ‘sense’ and more commonly, ‘common sense’, which seems to be rather uncommon in today’s mass.

Being NOT sexually attracted to someone IS NORMAL

I know three people so far who are not comfortable with touching. I have asked them, “Would you like a hug?”

I have been rejected a lot of time.

Are they asexuals? I don’t know.

But see? People know whether they like touching or not. Some people find the idea of anything sexual very ‘creepy’ and ‘disgusting’. Some people are fine by the theory but they DO NOT like Practical. Some people like the idea, but are not very attracted to it.

These are all asexuals.

And mind you, asexuals are not aromantic.

I repeat, ASEXUALS ARE NOT AROMANTIC!

They still like the idea of holding hands, having a night out and stuff like that. Well, not all, but some do.

So please, please, my fellow human beings, increase you mind capacity and add these to poor communities who are still fighting for recognition even in their own community!

Have you ever thought about who are you? Have you ever thought what is the meaning of your existence here, in this world? Have you ever wondered if you really have a purpose on this Earth?

If you are anything like me or even a Gen Z kid, I think you must have.

Truth is, I don’t know either. I am trying to find it out. I am trying to find my purpose, my life’s aim. Not my dream, not my idea, but for whatever reason, I was born and brought into this world.

Too philosophical? Too mystical?

Okay, let me get back to the topic in hand.

Who are we? A few days ago, I talked to my classmates on this topic and I realized, many people did not know who they are. Self-discovery is practically unknown to a lot of people.

For a moment, close your eyes and imagine, just imagine that you have no relation with the person in front of you. They do not know anything about you. People do not know about your country, they do not know your parents, all they are interested in is who you are.

And if you can introduce yourself to this random person without any reference to your roots, congratulations my friend-you have a unique identity.

Self-discovery means finding that out. Finding out who you are if you have no roots.

Without my roots, without my past affecting my life in any way, I am a young girl who likes to read anything and everything that she can get her hand on, someone who wants to learn all the possible languages, someone who likes to help others and someone who wants to sit down beside any river in Meghalaya and spend the rest of her life there.

That is me without my past and my roots binding me down.

It is important to have this identity. This identity, this particular identity will help you so many times.

This identity may change over time. This identity may absolutely be wrong in a few years’ time. But as long as you have this identity, you will have that idea of the work that you have.

I personally believe that each one of us has a purpose on Earth. It could be something as small as stopping someone from crying or as big as finding the truth about Atlantis-but each one of us has a purpose in life. We must keep working to find that purpose. And in the path of finding it, we should keep working on achieving all our dreams and making ourselves happy.

In the great Poet Max Ehrman’s words:

“You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. ”

So, once again, I ask this question.

Who are you?

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton