One of the things I don’t understand is this immense and deep obsession people have when it comes to heartbreak and pain. They say that when you undergo the process of getting your heart broken, we give birth to our art. That’s why we are familiar with Cobain’s words, “Thanks for the tragedy, I need it for my art.” We often nurture the feeling as if it were our child, being cradled in our arms, pushing away its hair off of his face, and encouraging him to grow to the boy he is about to be in the future. We often romanticize the feeling of staying up late at three a.m. in the morning, eyes puffed up from crying, lips stained with prayers and wishes that someday this pain will make absolute sense to us. We write about our experiences, ink them on journals and back of receipts, paint them on empty canvasses and create sculptures out of them, immortalized the emotional state you’re in, and beg that words and colors would be enough to delay the agony that’s been raging inside our chests.

But that’s where we are wrong. Heartbreak and pain shouldn’t be the benchmark of the art we’re going to make. We should write when we are happy, when we are in the highest state of our minds, with the world under our feet and the sky just within reach. We should write when the tears in the corners of our eyes are creation of pure joy, when our hands shake because we are so **** happy of the state we are in, when our knees turn soft because we couldn’t stand the fact that here we are, frolicking in the waves of pure bliss. So that when we are sad and feeling the blues, we have something to read or something to look at and think, “Ah, those were good times. Those were the happy times. Those were the best times.”

People will always tell you these romantic things. You know, ‘I’ll always be there for you when you need me.’ ‘You can always count on me.’ ‘Call me anytime and I’ll pick up.’ ‘I’ll walk the earth for you, even cross oceans for you.’ ‘I love you, you’re really important to me.’ But it’s all ******* and sometimes you don’t realize it until it’s a little too late. Why? Because when you need a ride home after a terrible night drinking alone in some pub downtown with your head aching like a thousand phone calls ringing or when you need someone to talk to on a Monday night after exhausting yourself at work and they’re too busy. They don’t really pick up the phone. They’re not always going to be there for you. Believe me, when all these flames had worn out and the feelings had gone cold, they won’t really walk the earth for you or cross oceans for you. And you don’t need that kind of treatment. I know I don’t. I don’t want anyone to just say those things, I want them to do it. With me. Walk the earth with me. That’s all I’m asking.

i. You still remember the words she said the night she left. She had just returned home from a party, wearing a red dress that didn’t match her pink shoes. Her hair was wet from the rain and she looked like someone you didn’t know. You asked her how was the party and she gave you a look that you didn’t recognize. Then she said, slowly, while her hands were reaching out to hold yours, “I’m not happy anymore.” and you asked what she meant when she said she wasn’t happy anymore. With a final look in her eyes, she said the words with such clarity, “I don’t love you anymore.”

ii. Every time you go out now and see someone wearing a red dress similar to what she wore that night, you stop. You stop whatever it is you’re doing. You catch your breath, clutch your chest, and pray quietly that it’s her, God, please let it be her. But that someone will turn around and it’s not her and somewhere between relief, regret, and misery, you continue what you’re doing and you carry on with your life. Just like how you did when she left.

iii. When the scars don’t heal, the pain doesn’t fade, and every night you go to bed, looking up the ceiling and thinking, where did I go wrong?

iv. It’s true love when it is just **** too late.

And eventually, you will meet someone,
out of the hundreds of people you’ve met in your life.
She’s ordinary and does the same things like everyone.
She wakes up in the morning, fix herself a cup of coffee,
does household chores, work her way out through the day,
drinks wine, read thick novels, and sleeps soundly at night.
But she will turn your world upside down.

This seemingly ordinary human being who is like
any other human being suddenly starts to become
the only human being in your life.
And you start to ask questions.

Like, why her? Why now?
Why does your heart beats faster when
she’s around and slows down when she’s not?
Why do you dream of her? Why do you see a future with her?
Why is your mind filled with the image of her face,
her warm smile, the curves of her body,
the roundness of her *******, the thickness of her thighs?

Why is her laugh the most beautiful music you’ve ever heard?
Why do you feel wonderful and glad when she says your name?

Suddenly, everything just seems to lighten up.
You are entering uncharted territories and
it feels so good to get lost in some place
that isn’t just built for sleeping and dreaming,
isn’t just four-walled and filled with furniture.

Home, more than buildings, houses,
and four-walled rooms, can be a pair of arms
around your body, like a second skin on you,
a birthmark you can never get rid of,
a memory you will never forget.

My dear, you deserve the kind of love that is not perfect but will wrap its arms around you, runs his fingers through your hair, and kisses your forehead most tenderly. A love that stays even after you told him to leave, always ready to accept you with open arms and an open heart, the kind that stays true to his roots and words. A love that makes mistakes, has downfalls and shortcomings, but will make it up for you because he does not want to lose you. A love that argues, has flaws and differences…a love that is not perfect but it is exactly what you need.

And that’s the problem with her.
She doesn’t have a lot to begin with,
she thinks it’s only enough or maybe
she only has a little less than the others.

But she doesn’t know when to stop.
She doesn’t know how to stop giving
others the things they don’t deserve.

She doesn’t know when to stop watering
the flowers long after she had just
given the most unbelievable spring
of love, care, and attention to them.