when I don't know where to put the love

I shove it down

I search for new things to cook. Something elaborate, and grand. A cake requiring 6 eggs and all my focus. Maybe that will distract me.

I devour books. My goal being 35 for this year, hoping soon enough I’ll be able to increase it and feel smug while doing it.

I take a nap.

I rearrange my cupboard.

When there’s nothing for my hands to do, nowhere for my heart to go, no space for my brain to wander, I deflect. The irritation comes bubbling up, possibly reaching a crescendo, maybe a hobby will bring it back down.

A new project. Staring out of the window. Making creatures out of inanimate objects: a smiley face in a trashcan, a butterfly in the grill, a disco from the church lights.

In the desolateness of my grand mid 20’s, no structure, no routine, dwindling relationships and a general lack of most things coupled with a desire to be everything but an all encompassing inertia; what is one to do? In a world lacking community, scoffing at the bare minimum, an app for everything, no need for human contact anymore; I’m still grasping for a sliver of warmth from a stranger or a smile from somebody in the bread aisle.

A life by myself.

When I don’t know where to put the love, I stuff it into the depths of my pockets. Beige, drab pajamas filled to the brim with uncertain and unsteady love. Shorts torn at the seams, love escaping through the cracks. The emotion is tangential, drifting away, swaying with the wind, maybe finding its way to its rightful owner. Or perhaps to somebody who needs it.

Head to toe, there’s no where for it go. In my breast pocket, or perhaps my white shoes. Maybe in my black bag or my new ring. Wandering with no place to go, living a nomadic life, hoping for somebody to bring it back to life, or at least give it a home.

As I look up, the gaps of sunlight between bushy trees speak to me. A reminder that love is all around, most things are okay. The sun touches me and then hides away, a second later coming back, as the leaves sway with the tide of the wind; things move. They just have to.

It is terrifying to be everything yet nothing at all. To have a strong persistent connection with the past, refusing to let go, yet a clear vision into the future, unsure on how to reach but it seems close enough. To be stuck in between. To watch a show about 4 single women made 30 years ago, and think “am I one of them now?” Having each question punch you hard in the ribs, “so are you seeing anyone? a new job? how’s work going?” and ending with “yes it’s all bleak right now”. Only to end up seeing yourself being swallowed by the spiral that is called real life. On the brink of greatness but too afraid to go and bask in it. At the precipice, one nudge, one push is all it takes, but there isn’t enough force. The love flies to different people, anyone but me.

Squeezing the love into sides and corners forces a floating into the past. Thinking of former relationships and friends. People that were once everything and now are a memory Google photos brings up. Or perhaps some fuzzy moments that you didn’t know you’d miss in the future. Like the random party you had in your flat for 3 course mates you met far too late in university, who brought into that night loud laughs and the most absurd drunk conversations. Or maybe all the walks to and fro the grocery store, hiding from the winter, hoping for the clouds to open up. Smoke breaks outside our flat. Reaching and nodding at the doorman, some familiarity. Summers that were spent lying on the marble floor, the coolth emanating through the ground while your forehead sweated. A week in the hills as a confused pre-teen, trips to the tea garden where everything seemed sorted out, you just had to follow along.

Pushing the love away only brings back the memory of it.

Agonising over every detail of a meaningless interaction, overthinking the way you folded your hands or how your hair flew into your lip gloss, the love flies away covered in a desperate larva of hopelessness. Out of the jumbled up web of knots and mixed feelings, comes out a disfigured form of love. One that you never knew existed. Something unholy and perhaps wrong, a discoloured version of what we think love is. Not pink or candy red anymore, it comes out in different shades of grey. Mucky and ugly, but the love is still there, in all its twisted glory. Born out of casual dating and soul sucking loneliness, a newfound romance; between you and your ideal self.

It is intangible and uncontainable. Something so quick yet when it floats in front of your eyes, time stops. A glowing jellyfish or perhaps a butterfly made up of 5 colours. New and brilliant, jaw dropping and stunning yet warm and comforting, allowing you to regress, allowing you to relax. When it’s yours to keep, it’s all those things and more. Until then, it is uncomfortable and tough, finding the right spot, not letting it escape, forcing it to call you home.

When I don’t know where to put the love, I hold onto it, clutching with all the force I have, hoping that one day, it’ll choose me.