I was brought up in a life of luxury. Not in terms of money, but love. I didn’t understand science, and I didn’t care for mathematics, and what was beyond the stretches of my knowledge, became magic. I saw magic in everything I didn’t understand.
I remember casting spells to the heavy rain, and attempting to store the petrichor in tiny glass bottles. I thought strawberries were supernaturally created, and chocolate milk in itself was a product of magic.
For me, the most exceptional and mysterious form of magic existed in the shape of a human. He did the most extraordinary things; he made me laugh after I cried, and brought home ice-cream from places that I never knew. He knew the answers to all my questions, and every night he dismissed all the monsters from under my bed.
I knew him as ‘dad’, but I understood that the word wasn’t big enough or powerful enough to describe how much I felt for him, and how deep our understanding was of each other.
Growing up, I now realize my childhood was unconventional in many ways. My mom is a stroke patient, paralyzed in the right side of her body, and she struggled to put into words all that she wanted to say. But my dad and I, we became best friends.
He became the inspiration behind all my school essays- ‘write about your favorite hero’, and became my confidante in all my high school girl drama. He showed me the world, and taught me its absurd ways.
I didn’t understand how one person can be so much- so much happiness, so much empathy, so much comfort. To trust someone is something so whole and beautiful, but difficult at the same time; and to have that one person who you not only trust, but adore, that’s nothing but love.
Every day I learn something new about him and admire all that he’s taught me to be grateful for. Every little quirk amalgamates into the magic that’s love above all. I still don’t understand him, I don’t know what he is, but I see magic in everything I don’t understand. I don’t think I’ll ever understand love.
