This Is Why I Write

It’s not enough to say I write because words have a way of feeling better written than said. It’s not enough to say I write because I want to say something. It’s not enough to say that I write because I love to. In all honesty, writing is a love and hate relationship.

Writing is the roommate I live with- quiet, apologetic, and mostly frustrating. She refuses to miss the mailman, crosses fingers that this time the envelope holds a good story. And if not, she keeps me awake at night, nagging on and on about what rhymes with lonely, broken, unloved. She follows the scent of coffee and cigars as if caffeine and nicotine are her life source. She doesn’t seem to quite know the difference between a good morning and a good night. She scares off the lovers who knock at the door. In red bright signage, she warns them: do not love. She warns me too: do not fall.

Writing is the random stranger that sits beside me at the bar- loud, obnoxious, unfamiliar. He offers me a drink, I take it. And as if he knows me, he asks “On a scale of just a beer to 5 shots of tequila, how much do you miss him”, to which I raise a bottle of beer and a smile that said I guess I’ll take some shots. And I mumble the stories- how the asshole who left me is now in love with my best friend, how I tried my luck one more time and this time it was worse, how I’m still not over this guy, how this guy I love asked me for advice on whether he should hold on to this new girl or not (of course, I said yes, HOLD ON TO HER AS MUCH AS YOU CAN). And this stranger offers me words. This random stranger holds my hair up as I vomit, and he offers me words. This stranger walks me home, and he offers me words. And the next time I went to this bar, I was alone. But I had words-loud in my head, words that told me I am beautiful.

Writing is this drug. I take it to compensate for the broken, to fight away the sadness, to keep me high and away from reality. I take it like it will keep me alive enough to tell as many people I can that they are beautiful. I take it as if it will keep me loving myself and loving more people, as if I have never been a victim of a tragedy.

Writing is air to my lungs. Though, I have never known how to breathe properly. Because up until now I still write horribly. I misuse words and misplace sentences and fuck up metaphors. But there will always be people who understand. And I don’t know these people. But somehow, they tell me that I have written words that they understand and that I’m not alone in this. And somehow from far places, I have felt their hug through words. That’s when I knew, writing is also love.