When was the last time?

I don't believe in "you just know."

What an awful answer that is. "How do you know?" "You just know."

My problem with that is: You never actually know. You could be wrong. Or, you could be right that you do know, but somehow it's not reciprocated.

I don't believe in "soulmate."

It's just a lazy word for explaining how things just work, how compatible they are, and how two people can see themselves willing to tolerate each other.

My problem with that is: If there are soulmates in this life, mine should have been you. But I don't think that we'll ever get any closer than that.

I don't think that we'll ever look at each other in the eye and feel equally relieved that, against all odds, we found each other.

And I don't know, do I? All I know is that I can't remember the last time I looked at someone and thought to myself, will you just look at him?

Because, God.

Your warm smile.

Your intoxicating laugh.

Your sense of humour.

Your mild sarcasm.

Your soothing voice.

Your eyes. On me.

. . .

If there was ever such a thing as soulmate, and how you know that is "you just know" ... Then you are mine. You should be mine. Because I just know.

But you're not, are you?

Friendship, Reflected

People told me that the older you get, the smaller your circle of friends would become.

I don't like to tell people that it's impossible to find new friends when you're an adult, but it's just... you change. You change your idea of what friendship means. You change your priorities. You change your view about someone, because then you realize that they weren't in a phase: it was them all along, and you can't change that. And most importantly, you change your mind. You made up your mind into thinking that you don't need toxic friends in your life. One way or another, you learn that if you know that a friend only brings you headache, you need to cut them out.

Somebody told me that I seem to have a very tight-knit group of friends who are solid. I don't know what kind of image I presented to the world, but I would assume that they thought I have the kind of group of friends like the friends in Friends (yes, that TV show we've been watching for the gazillionth time on Netflix). I guess that's true to a certain extent... I mean, there is not a lot of us, and we do seem to have some certain permanent members.  But in hindsight, I may have had a mild test run on that phase of life filtering out people who will no longer stay in it.

I know I'm not that old, so spreading wisdom shouldn't be my cup of tea yet. But I'm the kind of 24 year old who find enlightenment from her 17-year-old writings and old tweets, so I guess I am Ms. Smarty Pants.

The way I see it (and I did not see it this way before, because I'm an adult and... I change), what makes friends friends is commitment. Surprise, surprise. Turns out friendship does look a lot like romantic relationship, huh?

My friends and I have been though a phase where we did not see each other for a period of time and the humans we see were literally from a certain group of people: co-workers, family at home, clients. Uber drivers, maybe. That's it. And life (I guess) wasn't so bad that way, but it was not a good life. I personally missed my friends, missed our inside jokes, and felt pathetic for not knowing a world outside of people at work that I could not even choose at all.

I guess it worked similarly with my friends that at a certain point, we collided. We decided that we may not have as much time together as we did back then. We know we have different priorities now. We know that being selfish is so teenager/early 20s bitch. So we changed. We began to compromise: with time, and place, and not having the presence of everyone.

The older you get, the more you understand that it's a little too much to ask for someone to be 24/7 there for you. I know that there are all of these songs and movies written about friends who are always there for you, even when it's 2 AM and you're trying to hook up with some random guy, but that just doesn't happen. Sure, some people have that person and it's great for them. But if you don't have that? Honey, it's probably only because real life isn't always like that!

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