Writer: Gayatri Kapoor
The ocean is like love; I say to my parents one starry summer evening. It is late, and the balcony light flickers, weary with time. They laugh, my parents. It is not unusual for me to say such poetic, profound things, they think. The people who birthed me, they laugh and laugh at the idea that a naïve little girl could understand something as deep as love. You do not know love yet, meri jaan. Don’t worry, you’ll find a nice boy soon, and then you will know what it is to love.
I keep my mouth shut, purse my lips and force myself to swallow my anger lest I show too much of it. I want to tell them, want so desperately for them to understand that I do know, I know what it’s like to love.
I know what it’s like to fall in love. Maybe not with a person, but with the world, with music, with art, with love itself. It feels like being swallowed up by the ocean, blind, stumbling, yet when you are able to see the light again, it’s different. The ocean is like love.
I know what it’s like to love my family, to love the parents who are amused by my ideas, my brother who doesn’t understand them at all. I know what it’s like to love my family, just as the ocean engulfs you into its warm embrace, just as it guides you safely to shore and carries you when you cannot carry yourself. The ocean is like love.
I know what it’s like, to love my friends with a fierce heart, to love them so much that people don’t understand the extent of it. I know what it’s like to love my friends, just as the ocean reaches for the sand, just as it collides into jagged rocks, just as it retreats, with the offering of seashells to make up for its absence.
They think that romantic love is the only type of love you can fall into, but the truth is you fall into every type of love. Sometimes it’s a gentle wave pushing you forward, sometimes it’s as powerful and painful as a blow to the head. Sometime it’s a tsunami.
You can’t control love, no matter how hard you might try. You’re a victim of the ocean within us all. And the ocean cannot be restrained. The ocean is like love.
