i made one wrong wish.

or did i?

i remember being fifteen, just done with school. to take you inside my mind back then, i was essentially lost in my head, like most, if not many, are at that age. i had friends i didn’t feel deeply affectionate toward. i didn’t know what you were supposed to feel when a friend hugged you, or when they did nice things just because.

i felt confused, like a spectator, the way an alien would watch you pull something out of a refrigerator. i hated hugs for that very reason. not knowing what to do with them made me feel weird. the kind of weird you imagine you think you’d feel touching a frog (i’m sorry guys bear with me).

i never dated in school. i wasn’t even looking. how could someone who was still trying to understand friendship, the very base, or at least the first relationship you build outside of blood, be thinking about romantic relationships? and so i watched my friends understand friendships, relationships, heartbreaks.

i remember it very clearly. i wished i could feel a heartbreak.

that’s it.

a long silence of five years later, and here i was, with heartbreaks stacked like lego blocks.

i don’t ask “why me” questions. i’ve made peace with the fact that i wished for it. i also wished to feel everything. and as i went through each heartbreak, in one way or another, i only grew closer to myself and the things i enjoy doing. almost as if everyone who treated me well and then let me down was only coming into my life to push me closer to writing, reading, and my other 100 hobbies i don’t name, and they lay on my wall as sticky notes as i start them.

(you don’t understand how much i’m hating using the word “heartbreak” over and over again after the first time, but i’m going to endure it and keep it as is because i’m not about to dig for synonyms in my own brain.)

some days i curse myself for making that wish, as if that one sentence altered the entire trajectory of my life. but even if it did, i only see things getting better. and i like hugs now.

so maybe it wasn’t a bad wish after all.

because at least now i can tell you that i can get over anyone and anything, and i mean every bit of it. i might have nights or days where i wake up feeling weird and overwhelmed, but i don’t reach out. i give myself those few minutes of self-pity, and then we’re back again.

because, sadly, like many others, i don’t have the luxury to spend days on it.

nor the time.

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i’ve always wanted to be a busy person when i grew up. that was something i liked about myself early on. i wanted a demanding job, a hundred hobbies, all of which i’d be decently good at, if not exceptional. i always knew my job wouldn’t be my passion in life. it would be something i’m fairly good at, something that lets me solve problems and use my creative side just enough. and i liked it that way. i had no complaints then, and i still don’t.

i work in tech now. tech isn’t my passion, not even one of the many few, whatever they are. i like writing, filming, creating. i like singing too, and many, many more. what i’m trying to say is that i like creative expressions of my thoughts and feelings, my very personal opinions and perspectives, however mundane they may be. i believe everyone should be in the pursuit of finding such an outlet. so maybe my tech job is also an expression of the said creating.

coming back to the point, i do my share on the side. in the hours between office, family, and friends, in the hours i’m travelling, in the hours just before i shut my eyes and end the day.

(i don’t keep myself busy to avoid my feelings, so rule that out. i know that’s what you’re thinking, especially if this is your first impression of me.)

i’ve been asked wonderful life questions. one of them always gets to me: what would you do if money wasn’t a deciding factor in your life? isn’t that the goal? don’t take away something i’m actively working toward in the question you ask me. if you want to take something away, take away the expectations and responsibilities along with the money. it’s not that i don’t have money or dislike responsibilities. i just want to reach a place where money lets me be irresponsible with my hobbies.

assuming i have no obligations and an infinite amount of money, i think i’d want to be, for an intense lack of a better word, a jumper, moving from one thing to another. i want to do everything in the world and nothing at all at the same time.

make me a ghost. let me wander invisibly in plain sight, and i will thrive.

but give me this only if you can divide my existence into two halves. equal or not. one where i’ve tasted connection, and one where i’ve tasted solitude. and let me appreciate both. because one without the other would leave me longing, and longing is a responsibility i do not wish to bear.

there’s a term i hear often in the talks and books of my religion: keval gyan, which by definition means the absolute knowledge of everything in the world. but with that comes nobility, and nobility, or even novelty, is a responsibility you carry for the reputation it earns you. so for now, let me make a compromise that lets me fulfil this desire with countable hobbies i set for the year. as i get familiar with each, i put them up as sticky notes on the walls of my room, like badges of proof that i was here, that i tried.

so i can carry that feeling into the next half of my life and leave them in the room, hanging, for the next person who claims that room.