“She believed in the possibility of a fairy tale. So she created her own magic, by taking a chance.”
For as long as I can remember, I have always been a realist. I come from parents who believed that if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Always apply for two to three colleges, in case your first choice doesn’t work out. Get a job, go to grad school if you can’t get one, get a PhD, if not, get an MBA. Never quit a job unless you have another job lined up first. For every plan A there must be a plan B. Now this is all fine and good for practical, solid things like school and getting jobs and what not. But the one thing you can never have a plan for, is love.
Like that’s obvious right? At least it should be. Except that if you’re a constant Type A, the idea of falling in love can be this….odd, intangible, ambiguous happening that you can’t wrap your head around. There have been hundreds of songs, books, and movies about how it happens. Boy looks over at girl. Their eyes lock. Boom, dassit. Or they casually ‘bump’ into each other in the street, because it’s fate and that’s what supposed to happen. That was all it took, and now they are living their happily ever after.
I’m gonna tell you why our generation has stopped believing in the magic, that is falling in love. Of course there are the lucky few that have met their soulmates in high school, or college. Maybe even earlier than that. But for the rest of us, it has come or will come later in life. The problem is everyone thinks they KNOW exactly how it’s supposed to happen. Based on what, exactly? Society’s ideals about love, falling in love, being in relationships, etc? Based on how our friends met their significant others? Our horoscopes? Tarot readings? Is there a manuscript out there, a rulebook that proclaims that this is how everyone will meet their mate? We spend so much time trying to picture how it will all fall into place, never even considering that it could be something completely mind blowing and unfathomable. We lost our imagination somewhere between being a kid and becoming an adult.
Why can’t the fairytale, be real? Why is it so ridiculous to think we could meet ‘The One’ at Starbucks, or in the parking lot at Macy’s, or on the subway? WHY IS THIS SO HARD TO FATHOM? Let me share something with ya’ll real quick. One of my closest friends decided to fly across the country to visit someone she’s only spent a handful of nights with in life. Because she has always believed in the magic, and believed that the most impossible and ridiculous could be IT. When she told me she was going, I looked at her like she was fucking insane.‘ Practical Mora’ over here is like, ‘ this dummy. This person could be a serial killer. She could get kidnapped. That doesn’t sound like a good idea.’ Where do those thoughts come from? They come from a place where imagination is stifled, the magic is laughed at, and falling head over heels in love is a myth. But then I started to think to myself, ‘self, what if she is on to something?’ What if that’s the key? Being so completely open, and willing to believe in the absurd and the unlikely when it comes to romance. Like maybe…..if all of us stopped complaining about how no one is out there for us, how our love lives suck, and how we’re gonna die alone….maybe we stop. Perhaps we try, and we hope, and we dream, for the ridiculous, the absurd, the unlikely, and BOOM. We create the magic. We create opportunities to meet the person of our dreams. Texting that boy. Smiling at that girl. Attending that party. Putting on some lipstick, and owning the damn night. What if we stopped hiding behind the practical and realistic (aka boring), and just did some crazy shit?! Imagine. Who knows what we all could be missing out on.
She made me think ya’ll. I decided to start making my own magic. I decided that even in a scripted movie, a love song, a romance novel, there could be a grain of truth. Characters who believed in the possibility of finding love. It is not impossible, or improbable. Your love life can be as ridiculous and amazing and wonderful and fulfilling, if you think outside the box. Try online dating. Go on that blind date your girl has been trying to set you up with. Ask that boy for his number. Talk to that girl on the train! Say yes to a date, even if you’re unsure how it will go. OPEN YOUR HEART AND TRY. Don’t get caught up in what society says or thinks. Stop making excuses for why shit can’t or won’t work out. STOP thinking so goddamn much. No one knows how the magic will happen, but know that it exists if you open your mind to it.
