LOVE ACTUALLY!

Girl, I still remember the first time I saw you

In your eyes I saw lights shining bright

Now, once I knew, I was gonna love you

Liked no one loved you

Like I never loved anyone before

Baby, baby, can’t you see

This is a love for you and me

I say, baby, baby, I wanna have only you

Ring a bell? It’s the beginning stanza of one of my all time favorite Bollywood songs. I have been habitually asking them, my friends - old and new about their love stories all this while. Today, the 14th Feb, 2011, as I sit and recollect everyone else’s love story, I reflect to “where did my story, my love story wane & stopped?” Well, a (((BIG HUG))) to start with, to all of you on this blog…the Beatles were right..."Love is all you need"...Happy reading guys!

Paul: He was my senior in college. Somehow I knew little bit about him all this while. He was a nice boy then, very gentle and kind-hearted, the kind most people dream about. He even had a good voice and danced well. Candid on the net: I still have one of his photograph where he is carefully playing guitar, it was given to me by a close friend of mine. It was a silent one-sided love. He was going around with another girl at the same time. Sure enough to break your heart but I was not completely unhappy. It was a love that I thought to risk not being loved in return. And to expose my feelings was to risk showing my true self. No one is happy all the time even if you are madly in love and have each other by your side, And not many relationships of course last for long that too when you look back on the whole things you end up looking silly. I was happy, happy most of the time. I still wonder whether any good thing had come from that love. Certainly, those small gestures made my life so enjoyable. It must be a difficult thing anyone could experience and get back the hurt when remembered but for me it was a sweet goodbye, a love to cherish in every way.

Passive: We met in college. He seemed so…I dunno…Perfect, I guess. He had grown up in Thimphu. Came from a good family, was intelligent. To me he was really handsome, handsome enough to make any girl ignore her best instincts. Back then, one of my friends had warned me “you might fall in love with P”, I guess I did fell in love again. It was such a foolish of me to be thinking of someone who had a girlfriend, yet again. He was a nice guy especially considering the fact that he was nice to me. There were myriad of things that went unsaid between us. There are still those unspoken thoughts. I wish I get that one chance, I could give him the letters I wrote to him in my crude book titled “Things I Want to Say to You!”  For the first time I fully understood that: Giving someone all your love is never an assurance that they will love you back! Don’t expect love in return, just wait for it to grow in their heart but if it doesn’t, be content it grew in yours.

Mr. HRN: I have no idea when my heart created that space for this one, I really don’t know. It was like this song: It started out as a feeling which then grew into a hope. Was it love, or just something that reminded me of something that felt a lot like, but wasn't, love. Just friends, friends then, until the end you know I still pretend, just friends. Our conversation weren’t exactly long but I admit I enjoyed them nonetheless. More than seeing him in real, I saw him more in my dreams. It was always “I must have been dreaming” moments with him. Wishing that he would leave me with some kind of proof that it’s not a dream in the morning when I woke up. This one too had a girlfriend when I knew that he existed. I read somewhere that “a sad thing in life is when you meet someone who means a lot to you, only to find out in the end that it was never meant to be and you just have to let go”. Yes, I let him go as well.

Well, that wasn’t a wonderful love story, love stories right? I’m friends with all three of them now. It hurt when I lost each of the various Martians I fell in love with. Today, every time I look up at the sky at night, I count three stars and smile hoping that they too are smiling back at me. I guess I’m totally convinced that no one loses anyone, because no one owns anyone. I have come to understand that ‘Universe has its law to break heart’. And it’s true that “Being in love with each other doesn't necessarily mean that you have to be a couple; sometimes you just have to be friends”.

Future scope: I would like to believe that I’m in love with someone I don’t know and who didn’t figure in my plans at all. I have left myself to be swept away by the first person to treat me a little differently. It’s just as well I don’t have his phone number that I don’t know where he lives. I guess that way I can love him without having to blame myself for another missed opportunity. In other words I’m letting him find me, in real and not just in our dreams.

Baby, ever since you walked into my life

My meaning of life has changed

I rearranged my entire way of looking at things

And all that I say is because of you

Because of my love for you

Baby, you have helped me find who I’m

‘Cos I can see who you are

You are a shining star

For me in our my private galaxy

Baby I love you

What’s life without love? Do you know yet that 2011 is a year of falling in love? Here’s to everyone falling in love: Spread love!!! Happy Valentines Day!!!

Lovey JC!

PS. Let me quote a line from one of my favourite movies Love Actually, “The thing about romance is....people only get together right at the very end”. I’m all prepared for a Prince Charming to appear and carry me off for good. Are you prepared? So hang in there! Much Love!