DESIGNED TO BE DELETED

A Map of The World

One of the ancient maps of the world is heart-shaped, carefully drawn and once washed with bright colors, though the colors have faded as you might expect feelings to fade from a fragile old heart, the brown old map of a life. But feeling is indelible, and longing infinite, a starburst compass pointing in all the directions two lovers might go, a fresh breeze swelling their sails, the future uncharted, still far from the edge where the sea pours into the stars.

— Ted Kooser

Dating in this day and age is a funny thing. It is a painful thing, sometimes. I'm not quite sure if I've mentioned it here before, but I read that there are some anxieties that we face in society today that our parents would not have faced two decades ago. For example, some of us tend to perhaps overthink about what the person we are texting is feeling about us, based on whether they respond immediately, or whether they have used an emoji, or if we have been left "on read". Two decades ago, dating was much simpler. You left a call, and if the person wanted to call, they would call back. There was no such thing as being left "on read" or blue-ticked.

In the past week, I have received The Great British Bakeoff Big Book of Baking. I'd ordered it as a Christmas gift for Adam, but it arrived very late, and I don't know what to do with it. I've diligently removed him from my social media, and forcefully stopped myself from looking up his profiles, anywhere. I knew it would hurt if I saw him moving on, and I didn't want to hurt myself. I've been on first dates with three different men in the past week.

Yesterday, though, in the morning, Hinge prompted me that there was a profile they thought I would be "Most Compatible" with, and if you haven't guessed it yet, it was Adam. It's the same photos I saw when I first matched him on Tinder, more than a year ago. I took a screenshot of it and put it on Instastories, mostly asking what the Hinge algorithm uses to decide that two people were most compatible, but then came my friends' responses. They asked, why did we break up? Why don't I give him another shot? I thought y'all were good together, etc.

I didn't know what to say, so I haven't replied to any of them. What do I say? I hurt him, and he wouldn't forgive me. It was the wrong timing for us, and we're not ready. It's not up to me to call the shots? He said he didn't see us working out together? I saw someone vaping on a Juul and it made me think of him. Whenever an article about Terrace House is suggested on my Google homepage, I think, do I want to read this?

There is something to be said about loyalty. I don't know if it's loyalty, but I am extremely attached to people. When I was in Singapore, time and time again, Adam and I would take turns seeking each other out. I didn't like anyone else enough to really invest myself in them. I know some people think we didn't even spend much time physically together, but that's not how I work. I fall for somebody really quickly, I always have, and then I find ways to stay in love.

There is a reason why La La Land affects me so much, although not everybody thinks the ending is devastating. The core of what I seek in life is love. I moved to New York, largely because of Adam. I know he wasn't the be-all, end-all, but he was like, my True North, for a good chunk of my time. I think a big part of being scared of moving on, is knowing that if a person can have feelings for someone else so soon, maybe what you had with them wasn't real, and they never loved you. I don't think love is easily replaceable. Or maybe that's just me.