May 7th 2020

11.15 pm

Lets have a little back story to my rant ,shall we ?

“Clementine : Hi, I’m Clementine, can I have a piece of chicken?

Joel Barish : Then you just took it. It was so intimate. It was like we were already lovers.
“

Its beautiful isn’t ? how something so simple, so normal as taking a piece of chicken from a stranger’s plate can be a
moment of intimate connection between the two?

Charlie kaufman really wrote a heartwrenching script for Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind (2004), so much that it
made one of my best friends call me up and cry after I hounded him to give the movie a shot. A guy who has never
cried for a movie (except endgame, we cried for that together) was breaking down. Clearly he was feeling a lot.
Heartbreak. Confusion. Pain because of lost love. I was consoling him and trying to make him feel better but I
realized what he needed was to let things out and more than anything, someone to be there for him and be
vulnerable with him. So my brilliant idea was to watch the movie “perks of being a wallflower” with him. I know.
What’s worse than one sad person? Two sad best friends but tbh, I didn’t care. My best friend was sad. The guy who
always holds everyone up was having a shitty day so I wanted to be sad with him. Taking the advice of Clancy, a
character from the adult animated series - midnight gospel, “we often beat ourselves up with hope. We often try to
look at the best and brightest things in life and honestly hope can be exhausting and the best thing we could do is let
go of it at times.” and we decided to be hopeless together.

End of back story. Lets get to the real deal , shall we?

So anyone who’s seen the movie “perks of being a wallflower” knows that it’s a recipe for tears but
what hit me hard was one line. One line hit too close to home.

Sam : I don’t want to be somebody’s crush. I want people to like the real me.

Maybe the reason this line hit me was because I’ve always been THAT girl. The girl everyone thinks is
pretty or cool or has a crush on but the girl who nobody knows or likes for who she really is. Now don’t
get me wrong, that is completely well..slightly my fault. I’ve always known that but that doesn’t mean
the blow didn’t hit me hard. That’s when I could feel it and honestly it felt pathetic. To feel lonely. It
didn’t just feel pathetic, it hurt too. That’s what being hopeless feels like I guess. I wasn’t just crying
anymore, I was struggling to breathe because like an idiot, I was crying into my pillow( do not try at
home). This feeling of being absolutely lonely and feeling sad that I haven’t loved or haven’t been loved
hits me only during one other movie and ladies and gentlemen as you wait for the clichéd Nicholas
sparks revealll, no you got it wrong,not the notebook. Its this movie called the Vow. I guess the reason it
makes me cry is because that’s the kind of love I want to have in my life. The kind that is healthy, fun ,
never giving up on each other even if one person gets into an accident and forgets the other person’s
existnce but still try to make things work and to sum up in one word, epic. So I was feeling horribly sad
that I have no one who will go the moon and back for me and someone I can love the hell out of and
that’s when another one of my best friends told me something interesting.

Hanu : That’s the thing Varshaa, if it was something that happened often, it wouldn’t be

Special.

Now Hanu was right but my mind was having too much fun playing tricks on me and decided to throw all
logic over my head and that’s when I realized something. Yes sure I was trying more to let people be
there for me when I am down but there was another problem I had forgotten to introspect. I have a
nasty habit of not letting people make me feel better. Don’t get me wrong, its not that they can’t, they
definitely can but for some reason, I just or well- my mind doesn’t let them. So when my close friend
asked me if I wanted to watch the good place with her because she thought it’ll help me feel better, my
first thought was to say “no I really think I should get some sleep” , my second thought was to say “ I just
wanna be alone” when I reality I wanted neither of those things. I wanted someone to be there for me
and for some reason I couldn’t bring myself to say yes because for years it has just been me.

The one thing I’ve learned is that life is not about the big picture. If it was, it would be a pretty sad
picture. Its not the big picture, its moments. Moments we share with the people we love. Moments that
become memories we don’t ever want to forget. What connects us as human beings is vulnerability. The
bonds we form in any relationship is not just the highs we experience with each other. It’s the lows too.
Its formed when its 2 AM with Unsteady by X Ambassadors playing loud on speakers when your best
friend is crying on your shoulder, when she can’t hold on anymore and when your eyes are hopeless. All
those moments when you are raw and naked, that’s when you become human. I guess I want to feel
that. Feel more of what it is to be human. To connect and to let go. I thought about how it would be if I
die tonight. I would have regrets. Among a list, not being in love would be in them for sure but I could
either spend my last hours overthinking about how I never got to experience something that great
novels are made of or I could spend time with one of my best friends laughing and truly letting go of all
the things I can’t control and for once, choose to be better. Chose to feel happy because maybe I
deserve to be. A moment of clarity for an overthinker and a control freak you could say and in that
moment, I chose the present. I let go of control. Heighted state of hopelessness you could say. So what?
So what if I never find love. Maybe I won’t. maybe I’ll die tomorrow. Maybe I’ll die on my birthday.
Maybe I will never get to kiss Oscar Wilde’s tomb ,Maybe I’ll never get to eat Malaysia’s pee whee or
something like that noodles. Maybe I will never turn hanu into a HIMYM fan but I didn’t wanna let any
of those thoughts come in the way of me having a good time right now. So I thought, to hell with control
and to hell with overthinking. So yeah, its been two hours since I balled by eyes out. Do I still feel
hopeless? Definitely. Do I feel like I will never be loved? 100 percent but did choosing to let go help a
bit? It did. If I die today, I guess I would be happy ish. I mean who gets to say that they spent their last
hours watching the good place with one of their best friends and laughing out loud as her best friend
trips and hits her leg on the laptop. I’d say that’s one hell of a last moment to hold on to despite all the
regrets.