As I write this, my fingers buzz. They want to be honest about love.
I’ve never been in it. When people ask, I throw around the common excuses. I’m not ready. I’m focusing on myself. I don’t have time.
But as I reach 24 years old, I start to wonder. Is my time running out? When I was a teenager, romance was something out there, waiting for me. I simply had to close my hands around it, bring it close, let it change me into who I am, who I’m supposed to be.
Now I reach out and my hand finds nothing.
Actually, I promised to be honest. And the honest truth is that my hand finds nothing because I don’t reach out. What once used to gleam alluringly at me became my very reason to walk away. I crave love but I fear it. I fear it will not be enough for me. Or it will crush me whole. I fear that I am not enough for love, or that I will crush it whole, tear it to pieces, find nothing in its wake. What if love means nothing? What if love only waits to be destroyed?
Everything I know about love is my reason to stay as far away from it as possible. And also the reason I inch as close as I can get without sinking.
Really, I must be scared, not of love, but of myself. Of how I shake when love approaches me, when it holds a mirror up to my face and says “here you are,” and I am nothing but forced to look inside. Forced to discover love is not fireworks or sunsets. Love is work, and more work on top of that. Noble labour. Love is created in the image of you.
So, if all my rambling has even one discernible point, it would be that I envy those who love easily. In my head, love is something that is supposed to be beautiful, and natural. Something that shapes you. A kind stranger to walk hand in hand with when the road feels difficult or destitute. And for that kind stranger to become a familiar face, you must let the self unravel, ugly bits and all. I guess I’m really only afraid to fall in love because I’m afraid to see myself.
But there is time. Funnily enough, we have a lot of life to live and this is our first time living it. I’ll meet love one day and love will show me who I am. On that day, I won’t be afraid (For now, I’ll let it sit).