#madlight

Oh god, Kim Hansol. It’s your turn this time, your birthday. I’m scared I won’t be able to muster up the words I have been saving to say to you today. Actually, scared is an understatement. I’m terrified. 

The issue with these birthday posts, you see, is I treat them as if you’ll see this. As if somehow, you’ll stumble upon it and be able to comprehend every word I say and somehow it will all click to you. You’ll understand your intrinsic role in not only my life, but in so many others’. And I’m great at pretending, great at acting as if that’s all true and this is my only shot. 

Only, you’ve simultaneously burdened and freed me with this one bit: you have read the things I’ve said to you. You have liked my posts and comments, have seen my stupid memes. You have replied to my direct message, and even if you only let the reply stay for a second, I saw that emoji. 

But this is all irrelevant. What matters is that you’ve seen the words I express as eloquently as I know how and I have spent every single one of these posts pretending that if only the subject saw how we felt for them, everything would be solved. 

It won’t be. You’ve proven that to me. Like in so much else, so many other absolutes I can’t decide whether I prefer broken or not, you are the exception. 

So this post isn’t going to be about you. It’s going to be about me, and if you somehow worm your way in, then that’s that. 

All I really do is write. Sometimes I draw. Not well, don’t get the wrong idea. I draw like you write, I suppose. You think you can’t do it all that well, and everyone tells you you can, but you can’t see it. But you do it because their praise feels good and you’re afraid if you stop you’ll somehow be worth less. Even if writing was your dirty secret when you were younger, or in my case, drawing, it’s come to the point where the relief you get from it is less of actual relief and destressing, and more of an exercise in instant gratification. 

People like this. People like this and people don’t get sick of this. But they get sick of me, and I get sick of me, and if I do this maybe none of that has to happen. 

We’re wrong, of course. But it feels good, doesn’t it? Just for a little while, even if it’s true to everyone else but you, it feels good to delude ourselves into believing we are more than this 2D thing we perceive ourselves to be. It feels good to pretend that we have value beyond this one thing that everyone says we have value in. 

But I’ve learned, in many ways, some through your eyes, and some through my own, that value is measured in so much more than the simple act of doing. I’m writing now, and yeah, they’re just words, but I imagine someday my words will be able to craft a story that will change someone’s life. 

I want you to know your dancing, your singing, your laughing, your smiling, your sadness, your writing, your experiences, everything you have ever deigned us worthy of seeing has changed our lives indescribably. You have succeeded. I think by the end of this, I’ll have succeeded, too.

A human being’s value isn’t always measured in what they can see. We can’t see the tendrils that spread out of us, we don’t see how they wrap around the people who love us and take them along for a ride. We don’t see what people don’t show us. And how much do you show people? 

That’s what I thought. A lot of the big stuff, we never really show people. So we’re worth so much more than we think possible, because you can only ever see the tip of the iceberg, only ever the tiniest bit of what you have done and the impact you’ve had. 

And that impact is so immense. I’ve said this multiple times, but I need to make sure you understand, what you have done for me in four months versus what the rest of the world has done for me in years is so shockingly enormous. 

You’ve taught me of the complexity of the human being. You’ve taught me that it’s okay to never really fit because honestly? No one really fits, they just file around until they find the closest answer. It’s like a multiple choice test. 

You’ve taught me life isn’t a test. Life doesn’t have any one path to accomplishment, no key. There are endless ways to achieve happiness, because every single person has to find their own way. 

You’ve taught me that it’s okay to not fit just right, and yes, I’ve heard it a thousand times but it never really clicked until this year, because of you. I can’t explain it to someone who has never felt it before but it’s this thrilling, freeing feeling. I hope you’ve felt it before, Kim Hansol. I can’t imagine anyone who needs freedom more than you. 

The amount of times I have wished I could free you the way you’ve freed me is absurd. You are so imprisoned by expectation, so caged by others’ demands of you, and not even just that, but yourself. You are caged by these beautiful, multifaceted pieces of yourself that you know everyone will try to label as right and wrong, but there is no right and wrong, because if you choose a right and wrong then you belittle the value of who you are and what kind of solution is that? If you define a part of you, a part that has grown, a part that holds its own place in every smile you have shaped your lips into and a part that lives within every hug, every happy memory. It sucks because you can’t even really define it either, but you hate it and you love it and it has become so much more than you anticipated. 

You are so much more than you anticipated.

You are so much more than I anticipated, more than your fans anticipated, more than the industry anticipated when it tried to kill Kiko. 

You’ve taught me that, even when you have nothing else, you have every piece of you that nobody could take away no matter how many damn times they tried, and how many times you tried. 

You’ve taught me how much courage it takes to love. But you’ve also taught me the strength of love, the power it has to genuinely achieve. It sounds terribly cheesy, but you’ve taught me that if everyone on the entire planet knew they were loved, knew of their value and their worth, where would conflicts start? If respect wasn’t just expected, but became a certainty. If smiling at strangers was a norm, if every single person you have ever admired just knew, how different would the world be?

You have given me the courage not only to love, but also to scream that love. You’ve taught me that success is equal parts hard work and shouting your progress into the void.  

You’ve taught me the danger of assumptions, about how it can destroy and how important it is to trust a person’s words. You’ve taught me, in the same way you’ve shown the complexity of man, the intricacy and somehow separateness of his mind. Sometimes it plays on your team, but sometimes, it plays against you. 

You’ve taught me to trust the people I love most, to put my faith in them and believe that my life is safe in their hands. You’ve taught me that it’s okay to be a little naive, because we spend so much time trying not to be ignorant that we become more ignorant. You’ve taught me that loving isn’t the same as trusting, but if you don’t love the people you trust, then what are you trusting them with? A mind that doesn’t belong to you?

I’m here, telling you, that six months ago this post would not exist. Because I wouldn’t be able to articulate like this, even if it doesn’t make sense, I’m crying now because all of the emotions I know to lay bare have been lain. 

I’m here, telling you that I am putting my faith in you. I trust you. I believe that you will take this love and know what to do with it. I believe you will take it, and you will understand it, and you will live it. 

I believe you will enrich this year, you will chase your happiness and bring pride to all those who have trusted you to do the same, to all those who love you most. I believe that this year, this 25th year of your existence, you will live your life as truly as you know how, and you’ll teach us even more. 

I want to say that we will try to make this year amazing for you, but I know, in your case, only you can reach your happiness. But if you get tired on that hike, we’ll always have water and shade to offer you. 

I love you more than words can capture, and it’s hard to believe considering I have used 1,696 words right here, on the spot, but it’s true. You are so much more to me than I have written here, and I need to ascertain to myself that you know that. I hope one day, I hope you’ll catch a glimpse of those tendrils you have shot out and see how they have encompassed so many, so beautifully. 

But most of all, I hope you can see your worth not only in us, but in yourself as well. 

Rest, eat well, drink. Stay alive and stay healthy. Rule your life on the terms of your own happiness. 

From this year onwards, we want to see you, as the beautiful butterfly we know you are, leaving your cocoon.