I'll feel you among the stardust that makes up my life

she has meticulously curated an array of flora over the many years she has lived here. roses in more colors than i have fingers to count; a hibiscus plant leaning over the fence, raining petals of orange-red on to the street; two mango trees that, in time will outgrow all the houses neighbouring ours, but in this moment, grow lanky and timid under my mother's care amongst a myriad other herbs and flowers.

i am four years old, and i am entrusted with the most important job: watering the plants. the hose is bright orange, and a little translucent. it's a game, outrun the water with your eyes before it shoots out in glorious force, staining cobblestones in a wet shadow of themselves.

i am four years old, and it's a game: water the plants as fast as i can, and in the precious seconds before my mother inevitably shuts the watertap, try and drench myself as thoroughly as possible.

my mother isn't impressed. how could she? worried that her wayward child will catch a cold, but i have no care. the water is cool and refreshing as it washes the summer sweat and mud i've inevitably tracked on my bare feet.

it's summertime, i am twenty-four years old, and my mother has recruited me in tending to the front-garden. it's a different house, in a different country, and though many things have changed, some stay the same.

when it's time to put the hose away after watering the roses, my mother takes a minute, and drenches me with the hose. and we reminisce. two decades on, the little antics between mother and child prevail still.

8 days ago marked the 12th year since i said goodbye to a childhood friend i have not spoken to since.

in 60 weeks, a star that crossed the sun's path viewed from earth on the day i was born will cross it again for the 25th time.

and today marks the first time we talked, four years ago, fresh from ending the longest and most significant relationship i've had with a girl, when we proceeded to trauma dump over an instagram dm for six straight hours.

at the time i didn't know how your presence would intoxicate mine. another four months before we hugged for the last time as you hopped on a plane across an ocean, the sunny bright colors of your destination in contrast against the blues we carried in our hearts.

BED

walk

elevator

walk

subway

walk

train

air train

bus

walk

walk

walk

airplane

walk

car

walk

elevator

walk

most assume it's because of my long-standing support for scuderia ferrari and the heritage that begets the awe for the stables of maranello; this is not a false assumption. in the decade since car#5 first raced in red, that obsession fueled a need to be closer to the grand tradition and undying passion of whose who swear by the prancing horse. and the sheer emotional healing whist you belt out the words to il canto degli italiani? pure unadulterated and undiluted emotion. just you wait. we bleed red. just you wait. but that's not why.

others believe that all those years of classical training in vocal performance caused my pick up of the flavors and nuances in la bella lingua. you can only listen so many times to don giovanni and le nozze di figaro before you start picking up phrases and vocal ticks. learning a language via art is an underrated method. and also. you can finally understand and accept the farfallone amoroso that lives inside of you. it's touching. it's finding meaning. it's giving... peace. but that's not why.

you could make the argument that because linguistics, anytime you learn a new language, others in the same family are easier to grasp. after all, if you spent three years studying french and then continuing to immerse yourself in it via shared memes and texts with your best friend, then it would naturally be a valid leap to pick a closely related language prominent on the other side of the coast and with a similar history of rich cultural depth and phonological vocabulary. and that time you lost a bet and were forced to spend a week speaking latin. that also probably helped.

but while these are good reasons why I *would* be proficient in Italian, they are not the reasons why I am.

the true reason: I wanted to get close to you. as close as I allowed myself to be, anyway. you, who opened your heart unabashedly at one of my lowest; you, who sang from the poets, in a tongue not of your own, of feelings too big to define and emotions too much to handle; you, who went away to the land of sunshine and smiles, a world of music and passion, a city of artists and lovers. and me, equally heartbroken and paralyzed by what we had found and lost, likening the method to the madness that began months prior, when you asked for me.

were you speaking in code? "quando men vo", you implied. la bohème. puccini. 1896.

And you, while knowing, reminding and longing,

you shrink from me?

I know it very well:

you don't want to express your anguish,

but you feel as if you're dying!

were you dying too? i sure was.

you asked me once if I thought things happened for a reason. were were supposed to meet the way we did? was it fated to end how it ended?

three years have gone by. i do not recall what the last thing you said to me was. but I remember how it began. the opera. in florence. the italian one about heartbreak and unrequitement.

Three video-calls, Four goodnight texts,

Five days of talking, Six hours of silence,

Seven words, Eight songs,

It's funny how with the passage of time, things that once meant one thing to you take on entirely new meanings when you revisit them.

When the author published this story in the olden days of 2006, I doubt he would have imagined a then-four year old finding two, almost oxymoronic messages two decades since the book's publishing.

And it's also very freaky that I would, on a whim, chose to revisit this book, and accidentally find answers to questions I've been mulling over for the past few months, and make references to things I learned a scant few days ago. Questions about what it means to want to make an impression with the little time my existence provides in this life; or searching for a way to articulate these thoughts I've struggled with balancing for almost 5 years now... or even employ in the dialogue, lyrics from a song I was listening to just this morning...

It's funny how things in life come to you when you need them the most and least expect to find them. I mostly remember Katherines for being a very funny, if nerdy book: I mean, how many YA novels dedicate and entire appendix to explain the mathematics which makes up a central theme of the story? (Not that many, is the answer)

And yet, revisiting the story almost 10 years after I first read it is a surprising pleasure. I realized that I am not alone in my convoluted, anxiety-prone thought spirals. The fact that people I have admired and been grateful to for years also try to make sense of the world, also seek answers to the same questions, and that at the end of the day, we are all sharing the same world with all of its quirks is such a relieving idea.

I matter. You matter. Our stories matter - for at the end of it all, we are remembered by our loved ones (and strangers) as stories passed down through generations - even if some of the finer details get misplaced. And I guess that's what I should strive to remember. If nothing else, sharing parts of me in the lives of my community of close humans and vice-versa will be my greatest accomplishment. As the good Doctor put it so aptly: We're all stories in the end. Let's make it a good one, eh?

For some reason I remembered the joy and love today. It felt like an extended embrace filled with reassurance and safety.

It fucking hurt and the skin around it was purple and flaked off within a few minutes. I remember just being in agony for the next two days as I struggled to move and go about my days.

That part of my thigh has since regrown a fresh layer of skin and even to my discerning eye is largely unblemished. All the people I've talked to have failed to notice it and even after pointing out, they refuse to believe that such an injury took place.

But I know it exists. It doesn't bother me and I mostly forget the whole thing happened in the first place. Yet when the light hits it at a certain angle, it stands out as a silent reminder of pain.

I think emotional pain is like that. People around you cannot really see it and sometimes refuse to acknowledge its existence. But I know. I remember how much it hurt and caused irreparable damage. I can see firsthand its lasting effects despite those close to me ignoring it or downplaying its magnitude.

Bonus points if the situation only exists because you made a miscalculation.

Is my sanity worth it?

As I lay awake a million miles from home, the dialogue of a sitcom playing on a TV I cannot see the only company in this hotel lobby at four in the morning.

There has to be more to it, right?

But inevitably they'll leave. Everyone always leaves. A story without end nor beginning, but just a constant ebb and flow of hollow numbness and searing pain playing like a broken record.

Everytime I go to a diner I remember that morning. It was probably one of my favorite days in my life. I haven't seen you in two years but you're still in my thoughts every other minute.

Why are you haunting me? Why do I celebrate the anniversaries of my pain? How have I survived for so long without you? What am I doing with my life? Can I please hear your voice? I hate you so much. Probably just as much as I love you.

A recurring nightmare, so full of hope and strife

She beckons me with sly smiles and bright eyes;