I went to get a manicure at this small nail salon last week. I picked maroon like I usually do – in the spirit of winter colors and February festivities – and sat in front of a man who I could barely hear through the masks and plexiglass between us. Even though we were in the same space, it felt as though we were seated on two different continents separated by a sea of unspoken words. He asked me if I was Indian and I said I was Pakistani. I wonder how he could guess while I was wearing a mask – maybe because we both knew how many South Asians had taken over Central Jersey. Or maybe because I hadn’t done my eyebrows in over two weeks and he knew that only desi parents could birth a child with eyebrows so unrestrained. I asked him where he was from and he said the Philippines. Then I asked him if he missed home and he said yes, naturally. And I thought, of course, especially when it’s snowing like a bitch outside. We didn’t talk much the rest of the time; he’d paint another layer of maroon and I’d let the color harden under LED light until we were three coats solid. He surveyed my hands to ensure perfection, and then extended his arm and placed it next to mine. I could see his eyes smile under his N95 as he pointed to my arm and he pointed to his. “Same color,” he said. As if to say, we might be from different places, providing and consuming different services, on different sides of the plexiglass, but we are one in the same. In a desire to connect for the briefest of minutes, he shattered every boundary and barrier separating us as human beings for a moment of commonality. To me, that was the purest expression of love – a simple desire to connect.
I’ve never thought of love as something that has multiple variants – romantic vs. platonic, platonic vs. familial, and so on. Love is governed by certain basic principles, and from there the emotion can vary in intensity depending on who this emotion is directed towards. Some loves in my life are strong enough to transcend temporality and, in their transcendence, these loves take their place as an overarching theme for my experiences. And other loves in my life are in their own personal vacuums of situation and circumstance, beautiful in their representation but confined to a space and time – temporary and temporal in their very being. The latter can be small moments with people – like the man in the salon or a fleeting romantic interest. Small moments that bring joy in remembrance and make living a little brighter. The former is dictated by personal choice – taking a temporal love and making a conscious decision to grow and nurture it. And from there, it builds and builds until it bleeds into future experiences and changes the way we perceive our realities. It is no longer time-bound, because it is a part of us.
It is a myth, that the act of loving means giving a piece of yourself to another. I always felt that love was not the act of losing because it is not selfish in nature. Love is the act of sharing – sharing parts of the self, of the mind and sometimes the body, of understanding and being. To the point where I am not giving and taking pieces of people, I grow because I have developed shared parts of myself that make my existence more communal in nature. I expand as I connect, I do not lose myself because I am in every part of this shared experience. And the other person expands with me in a process of constant addition. Addition that is fostered through trust and the purest of intentions, that allows them to share more of themselves. This is why loving another – be it friends, family, romantic partners – is an active choice. It is a choice to share, to watch someone grow over the years with the same curiosity and appreciation for how their personality morphs and shifts with time. It is a deliberate process birthed from true interest and an utmost respect, and in this manner it is consistent. What changes from person to person is how this love is received, how it is perceived, and how it is expressed.
To me, love is trying my hand at domesticity and failing miserably, and then trying again. It is debating whether deep space is more terrifying than deep sea, and making Thai Terminal ours because we love the authenticity of white lights. It is tea and cappuccinos on stressful days and making me late for class while picking up rose water chai lattes from Cup of Brooklyn. It is finance tips and cold showers and feigned interest in Amazon’s security glitches. It is hot Cheetos and Burger King Impossible Whoppers and putting ice on feet injured from sheer stupidity. It is of course, excruciating Twilight marathons in Redmond basements. It is grape mint shisha with Frank Ocean and Corbin and some Turkish dessert that doesn’t have a name. It is Chagall and Kline. Oysters at Zadie’s. Marlboro reds on fire escapes. Siamese twins on Waverly. 3am dorm room fries deep fried with chili sauce just like they do back home. Love is diners with obese kids ordering chocolate milkshakes from menus twice their size, and fire pits on the back porch in weather too freezing for outdoor activity. My heart expands for these infinite moments shared with people that mean everything to me. And my love is never-ending.
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