I was doomed from the start.
20 years ago, when Santhosh Jayakumar and Taruna Pamnani looked down at their first-born daughter, I wonder if they knew I would grow up to be a hopeless romantic. How could I not? After all, I was an extension of their love story.
My parents have the quintessential tale for a rom-com. They met while pursuing their MBA in India and had the worst first impressions of one another. The sardonic, South Indian boy paired with the fiery, North Indian girl.
Within two months, they knew they were going to marry each other.
So that tale of hatred was pretty short-lived.
If you know anything about India, you know how vastly different North and South Indian cultures are. Against all odds though, my parents made their 2-states love story work and got married. They were each other’s first loves and after celebrating their 25th anniversary this month, it seems they are each other’s last loves as well.
Do you get what I mean now when I said I was doomed?
It doesn’t end there though. Because unfortunately, I grew up on a steady diet of rom-coms, romance novels, and fairy tales. I took up writing as a passion and now I was not only digesting romance but writing it as well.
I wholeheartedly loved love.
Until I had my heart broken.
Now I had known love and lost it. I ran away from any signs of romance. The rom coms were switched for action movies. The romance books were traded for fantasy novels. The love songs were replaced with instrumental jazz.
I persuaded myself that in order to get rid of this all-consuming heartbreak I had to destroy this part of me. Love had made me weak. It had made me feeble and meek. I wanted nothing to do with it. I swore to myself that no amount of love was worth this angst.
It was easy at first to hide behind my walls: to read fantasy novels, watch action movies and listen to instrumental jazz.
I convinced myself that I was better off this way. After all, we as women are often chided as being weak for our love of rom coms. We’re accused of having unrealistic expectations. We’re considered foolish for having our fantasies and fiercely protecting them.
Now no one could accuse me of being weak.
But how wrong I was.
I can’t remember what compelled me, but I found myself staring at the play button for “Set It Up,” one of my favorite rom coms of all time one night. Without thinking, I hit play and began watching it. I was scared initially that this experience would end with me crying my eyes out.
Ten minutes in though, I found myself grinning at the banter between Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell. It became impossible for me to contain the excitement I felt with seeing their story unfold on the screen. While there was a stone weighing on my chest during certain moments, I felt at peace when the end credits rolled around.
All it took was an hour and forty-five minutes for me to fall in love with love again.
I realized that I could heal from my heartbreak without having to shun romance out completely. It didn’t have to be one or the other. I could be devastated over my love story ending but appreciate someone else’s.
My parents taught me that love is compromise. It means not only fighting with someone but for them. It is the aching of two souls for one another, the intimacy of eye contact in a crowded room. It is unconditional adoration of someone’s crevices and cracks.
How could something so beautiful be a weakness?
My love story might be over for now, but my story with love isn’t. These past few months, I’ve danced to enough love songs alone in my bedroom. I’ve grinned like a maniac while watching rom com after rom com. I’ve giggled after reading banter between the protagonists of my romance novels.
So, while this Valentine’s Day is the first one in two years that I find myself without my person, I know I’ll be okay. After all, I have enough love in my life and in my heart to be grateful for. (And a Netflix account to keep me company.)
This whole time I had it all wrong.
I was never doomed to love love.
I was blessed.