how love looks

Sometimes we forget how happy we made each other.  How we felt when we shared our first kiss, and that feeling of not wanting to part even when we both were sure that there will be a tomorrow.  Over time, we forget that.  That titillating feeling in our stomach that comes with each first - first time we fell asleep in each other's arms; first time we woke up to the sound of the other breathing; even the first time we missed each other.  The passage of time makes us forget.

Listening to my friend gush over her new guy, I was reminded.  How once upon a time, you made me feel the way she looked in front of me.  With a permanent smile on her face, and elation in her voice.  As the night went on and she shared stories of her new guy, I found myself sharing old stories of you.  Stories I haven't spoken of in a long time.

She had asked me earlier in the evening if I was sure I was over you.  I told her yes.  I didn't feel the same.

Even after I reminisced about our first date to the last weekend we spent together telling stories under the star-filled Phoenix sky, the longing for you was gone.  Eight years of waiting for you to remember how you felt when you first took my hand the night we met has been way too long.

I guess people do reach a limit and you've reached yours, my friend said.

I don't think you get that though.

Because you said I've been a bit colder.

And true, I've been different.

The sad thing is that I don't think you realize what it is.  That the last eight years was how loving you looked like.  And now, well now, is the look of the aftermath.
  

a photograph and its stories

I've always been a fan of photographs.  I can be pretty obsessed with them.  In fact, I tend to think that if I was braver and more daring, I would have skipped on law school and taken photography classes instead.  I guess my love for photographs makes sense since I love stories and a single photograph can tell many stories - from the perspective of the subject, the photographer, and the viewer.  Then, there's the real story.  

I took this picture while I was wandering around the streets of Rome.  Rome is one of my favorite places to take pictures.  There are so much going on at any given time of the day - so much stories to be found and to be told.  The tourist couple who are turning their heads at every angle trying to capture the history that surrounds them.  The woman sitting by a fountain, smiling after each time she licks the ice cream that is quickly melting from the heat and dripping from the cone in her hand.  The group of teenage girls sitting on the steps of an old church, laughing as a teenage boy dances in front of them.  And the lone girl who throws a coin over her head into the Trevi fountain.  What did she wish for?   

And there was this view from the rooftop of the apartment I stayed at during my last visit to Rome.  It was right before sunset, and we were high enough that the street noise were just muffled sounds, and in fact, at that time of day, almost inaudible.  The only sounds that could always be heard clearly were the bells coming from St. Peter's Square.  Every time I look at this picture, I remember why I believed (and still do) that Rome is a place where hearts can be healed and spirits restored.