good evening

i may be a little bit buzzed writing this, and i don't know if i'll have the same drunken courage to press publish as soon as i'm done rambling

i have had the pleasure of multiple catch-ups with friends the past week - friends settling in, and friends in transit - and all I could think of was how blessed i am to have friends who love life (and themselves) enough to bring themselves to where they need to be.

i am currently at home, sitting in my room, three cocktails in and forcing myself to slow my typing to avoid a keyboard smash of emotions, just because i find myself so deeply grateful to be alive, to be loved and to be able to love. i count myself lucky to know this feeling, to feel it in my bones. i wish i could bottle it and give it away.

gratitude is a powerful state, because i’ve found it can get me through almost anything. the first wave i ever truly felt it was in 2019, at a crossroads in my career and having the feeling creeping under my skin, almost vibrating me out of it, knowing i was exactly where i needed to be. i remember staring outside the window of my cab after a job interview and just knowing that the opportunity i was facing was what all those paths led me to.

the second time was during a session in therapy, realizing what is and isn’t in my control, making peace with that and learning how to verbalize it - “i’m okay. i think i’m really okay,” i told my psychiatrist. and he looked at me over the Zoom call, smiled and said, “yeah, you know, i really think you are.”

the third was in Singapore just this past June, standing in a crowd of fans watching Suga of BTS perform Snooze from his latest album. i had, against all odds, managed to watch one of my favorite artists perform and i couldn’t help the tears when he repeated the refrain, “everything’s going to be okay.” all i could think of was my sister, the year i’d had, and despite the tragedy - comfort. it was okay to be alive. it was okay to still feel alive. i could allow myself to feel alive.

in the past year, i’ve been to three weddings, with one more coming up by the end of this month, i’ve waved farewell for now to four friends who have moved abroad (maybe temporarily, maybe not), with another one leaving in September, and i’ve attended three different wakes, my sister’s included. life is fast, and it stops for no one. life keeps moving, and we need to find our pace within it.

we are all in flux, and i’m just as guilty of hoping, praying, wishing that things would slow down so i could catch up, compounded by my own self-indulgent existential musings on what life is all about. i’m not saying i have the answer, but maybe it really just about the little things: giggling with a friend over 2AM cup noodles, a well-made cocktail and the company that comes with it, your dog’s wagging tail when you call them for belly rubs, playing Beatles records for your dad, catching your mom up on the latest gossip from your friends. sure, life must be greater than the sum of all its parts, but the parts can be pretty damn good.

in the moments gratitude washes over me, my cup feels full. it’s a deep awareness to stay grateful for the good and the bad. so much of life sucks, but also there’s so much of life to love. and maybe that’s the point of all of this: to love. there’s so much of life, because there’s so much love for it. we keep moving because love (for a thing, a person, ourselves) nudges us in a certain direction.

i started this substack quoting from Tick, Tick, Boom - fear or love, baby, actions speak louder than words. And all I can think of now is, this gratitude, is that what you get when you let love lead you? if it is, well damn. i must be doing something right.