when lovers look love like sex

 "its just simply like that. my priorities have changed. i am working my ass out and the only thing i am asking for is to feel it again."

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sometimes i just want to be reminded how we became siblings. you see, my sister just recently moved to the states. she left a family who is dead worried and a boyfriend for five years.


one day, mom called me to discuss about the guy. she told me that he has been calling her almost every hour just to say how much he loves my sister. so its no big surprise, when he said that he wants to marry her. the surprise came when my sister refused and finally called for a cool off.

this drove not only her boyfriend but everyone of us crazy!

you see. my sister and i could probably the closest in the family since we were just a year apart. however, in terms of personality, we are completely opposite. she is religious, i am spiritual. she is bookish, (i want to say) i am street smart. she is sheltered, while i am adventurous. there is not a single thing we share.

"kuya, i am tired. i just do not feel it anymore. when he says he loves me, even if it i know he really mean it, it just dont simply go across. believe me, i tried everything but regardless of what i do, i just cant simply bring back that feeling anymore. everything is not the same. i know you will tell me again, how immature i am. how i am still stuck up with those highschool kilig! how i should have not read those romance novels and watched those teeny bopper films. but i am who i am.and i dont think that will change."

***

two weeks after, a close friend from college organized a reunion. she wanted to hang out with the gang just like the good times. looking at us over a table of ribs and shacks, i can say a lot have really changed.  but when i was about to say its for the better, she dropped the real reason of the get together.

"i am filing an annulment."

our jaw dropped.

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when all of us were green envious of how her life turned out; peak of her career, wife to a surfer artist who owns a business, have the most travelling stunts here and abroad, here she is planning to break up with the man we have always dreamed for her.

"there is no third party neither he did something wrong. in fact, he is wonderful. more than what you guys and i have asked for. but somehow, i just feel like i am not being true to myself and worst to us. he has been a wonderful man but for some reason i cannot appreciate it. its seem like i am being unfair."

she mentioned about getting alienated with all the things she wants to do and the promises around her. she feels like she is like a not cage pet bird. she can fly but too scared to go out. it is as if she is all tangled and tied with an invisible string of considerations.

***

when many people equate sex to love, we laugh at them. but here are the most of us, not realizing how funny we look at love like sex.

always craving for that insatiable journey filled with paradox, excitement and passion; without realizing how short-lived it is. hence, we continuously repeat the scene, praying that whatever those feelings were will remain. however, they don't.

funny how everyone long for a lasting relationship but refused to accept the fact that these feelings are usually temporary. of course, there will always be a million ways to prolong it, but at the end, it is just a matter of accepting-- settling.

i may never be able to make this understand by my sister neither to have enough guts to tell this to my friend, but i guess, love and relationship are not always for the selfish. its not always about how good it feels like. how it makes our stomach turns, tickles our spine and makes us smile, its a matter of accepting the time when this feeling will eventually fade to open doors for another feeling--- a more "mutual one".

a feeling where impressions and superficialities no longer matter. where the most lavished and sweetest gestures transgress to gentle holding hands or kissing him/her first thing in the morning even without brushing nor gargling. its not simply about what makes you happy but how both of you make each other feel contentment.

love is not like sex. it does not extinguish after orgasm then you can repeat again after each wake up.

just like what gaiman said, omnia mutantur, nihil interit (everything changes, but nothing is truly lost). denying change drawn from fear of leading into nothing, simply means refusing to be someone better.

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at the end, love and life is not about lingering the past, but appreciating the present and keep going for tomorrow--- together.