What is it called when you lose your grip on anything — or anyone — else?
I saw you walking on your back, further away from me, and I did not cry. Maybe you just were never for me.
I missed the last train and I did not curse myself. A night stroll and a sleepover at my best friend’s were never a bad option.
I stopped talking with my best friend of five years and I did not yearn. Maybe God was trying to tell me something.
I forgot the name of the bakery which pastry I happened to stumble onto when I was in town and I never tried to look for it. I believed I would find another one that’s even better in another city.
I got drenched in the rain and it got my favorite shirt wet. Totally fine. I can always wash it at home.
I am late for class. I don’t mind running my steps along the stairs, there is always enough time.
I failed my neuropsychology exam which I studied really hard for and I did not shed a tear. I knew humans wouldn’t be good at everything, and that’s okay.
And over and over and over again, I nearly forgot what it feels like to having something to hold onto. I never knew if it was because I had too many occurrences of being left behind, or if it was for the endless nights where I got too disappointed with whatever I had, but I knew I was sixteen when I detached my strings.
I knew I was sixteen when I chose to move forward without gluing my feet to the ground. I knew I was sixteen when I found out that with attachment comes disappointment.
Good lord, what if I don’t get to feel again? What if all the remaining softness within me starts to feel numb?
I still think that way from time to time. But after learning how one could be broken and never whole ever again, maybe benumbed wasn’t a really bad feeling. So I learned to let go of the things I used to hold close. I learned to exist and stand still without them around, and it was killing me at first, it was gagging me with loneliness and deprivation, it was like shooting holes all over my heart, but years went by and I was never been more whole. I have managed to live with a full heart despite all its emptiness.
I have learned to live this way, and strangely enough, I found comfort in staying empty.
