Yearning for the unknown

How do you miss something you can’t explain?

Some days, I feel unsettled— like there’s something I’m missing.

Something I can’t place.

Something I don’t know.

It’s the most annoying feeling ever. It leaves me confused, torn between two things I can’t name. It leaves me yearning for… what I don’t know.

On days like this, I yearn for everything I can’t keep: friendship, love, joy. I…

What?

And then, I look for an antidote.

With my writing? It fails, but it helps.

Reading? I can’t focus—If only I could.

Sad songs? Lengthens my sour mood.

What do you do when you don’t understand how you feel? What do you do when you can’t place if it’s sadness, anxiety, or just unhitched thoughts? What do you do when you yearn for something you can’t even define?

I’m an expert for yearning for friendship and love. I daydream about them, moving from one imagined scenario to the next in my head. If my brain is jotting down all my thoughts, it would be filled with so many failed scripts of movie scenes.

Failed because, even though I long for these things, I suck at making them work.

I’m not ready to be vulnerable.

I’m not ready to trust and be trusted.

Funny because without these, I can’t have those.

Show me a friendship or relationship built without vulnerability, and I will show you an infertile land— dry to the touch and bitter to taste.

To actually connect with you, I’d have to tell you about my day, leaving little to no details. I’d have to share my icks, my unfiltered thoughts, my secrets (maybe), my dreams, my plans, my aspirations. Phewwwwwww. I adore this in books and movies—it melts my heart— but in reality? I am an open secretive person. At the back of my heart, I just feel that telling someone about my thoughts and routines will make them… mock me. Laugh at me. Find me boring. See? I lack trust.

For someone who cringes, most times, at “I miss you” texts, this feeling is unbearable. But it’s also an art.

An art because I’m trying to decipher—to explain—how I’m missing what I can’t keep. Something that’s not mine. Something I don’t even know.

The feeling is beautiful, wholesome, and confusing.