a love letter to the people of life

this life I′m gonna have myself a real good time with people.

doing nothing together, doing something together, I’ll take it all. I’ll take us working in the same room minding our own, each nestled in the personal zone, maybe pausing for a stroll across the cobblestone. I’ll take you glued on the phone the whole day, me sinking within the couch, her comfortably potatoeing on the fauteuil, and another of us prepping dinner. I can handle the dishes. I’ll take us traveling around, sometimes following and sometimes leading, booking and explaining, awing and laughing, playing and singing, talking and sharing, planning and seeing, inventing moments and painting memories. I’ll take us discussing systems and planets and then surrender and scroll, beautifully exhausted from being deeply together.

i love people and I love my friends being them in the most ordinary forms. I love M. laughing uncontrollably, S. talking unexplainably loud after sleep, G. maniacally tidying up tricount, or F. studying wikipedia before visiting the place. I love friends who are unapologetically themselves, driven by the love of who they are rather than by fear of who they are not. I think of R. being uncontainable R., I think of M. not afraid of karaokeing in front of thirty people with the restaurant owner simultaneously entertained, delighted, and very concerned, running to take control of the equalizer and quieten the whole thing down, but I also think of R. unable to hide he wants to withdraw at ten pm and G. looking at him like a grown-up looks at a kid.

i love who brings intensity to things that others wouldn’t be so sure would deserve it. I love F. seriously considering flying on the other side of the ocean for two days to have a last ride on a roller coaster before its farewell. I love E. drawing me into city planning and I love G. for drawing me into how a random Dutch city train station renovation has no business being that good. Sharing memes are modern love letters. I love D. enthusiastically being able to explain how airplane flaps work, P. spending a good twenty minutes finding the perfect croissant and D. admitting that yes, there is no one like him finding good spots. We both call them Ambitious Bakeries. I love myself for doing the same with coffee and I love the people who I travel with, who oblige to my needs of finding the perfect hipster coffee shop every morning. The Cathedrals of Coffee, there is an insane one in Beijing. I love S. getting excited at mundane food at a 7-Eleven or at mundane food on an intercontinental flight. She is genuinely happier about that than top-notch restaurants. And I can’t help but love the flight attendant who smiles at me when I ask if they have extra coconut bounties in the middle of the night. I'm probably the thirtieth person on the flight who has asked already.

i love the weird and the people embracing weirdness. I love E. getting excited in front of the hotel where Craxi got thrown coins at, G. sending me Korean gestures and dances, J. drawing portraits of future dates, H. learning how to tattoo, P. writing poems, T. leaving it all to just dance, G. being surreally good at geoguessr for no reasonable reason, J. talking about the history of China after five minutes of knowing each other, T. for really wanting to discuss an idea and that idea being building a network of castles to deep dive into modern meditations, and A. asking strangers if he can sleep at their place for a couple of nights straight upfront. He also tries to split the bill equally when I have clearly eaten half of what he did.

i love people showing their sensitivity and feelings. K. so obviously an introvert but trying very hard to conversate, F. feeling overlooked and having the courage to tell me, R. unsure how to deal with social interactions and prepping friends as defensive shields and a collective social dam. I love people blatantly excited. My friends who can’t wait to sleep all together in the same room, S. so happy to meet again after we haven't seen each other for two hours, K. who doesn’t matter what I reach out to her for but will always say omg Brando i miss you so much.

i love people who care. I love M. when he takes the time to talk to students and code an app in front of them to get them excited. I love M. when he goes to the Sunday market to pick fresh mushrooms and tagliatelle for the group. I love H. who cares so much about beauty that takes a five-pound book around because you never know you might end up in a beautiful place somewhere to read it. I love F. for helping and going the extra mile. He truly wants to help. I love Z. for traveling from London to Berlin just for a couple of hours with my students and I love J. for trying to do the same for literally one night. I appreciate his disclaimer on snoring. I love B. when he receives a Tesla at work and one of the first things he does is propose a trip. I love M. who unprompted picks me up at the airport in the middle of his workweek. I love when my friends come to surprise me for my birthday and I am fully more surprised that this happened more than once. I love G. for putting all of herself into baking wonderful cakes for us, and I love A. for loving me like he does and not being afraid to say he is afraid. I'm sure you will find the right way to finally click and respond to your true calling. I love C. when she asks me five times how I am because she really cares, L. when he asks me ten times how I really am cause he notices I flee away from the topic, and I love that he creates the time and space for me and C. to really say how things really are.

i love people. I love the old rotisserie owner who assures you the food isn't going bad if it turns red, it just doesn't contain bad stuff. I love the bookstore guy who gives you ten book recommendations even if he knows it's unlikely you'll buy even one. Or if not, I love his optimism. I love the waiter who despite eight hours of standing service going back and forth finds the energy to joke. I like the idea of him liking to entertain people, but I like even more the idea of him doing it for fun. I love A. for honoring and ritualizing taking time together and M. for moving to the mountains at 26, following the quiet voice that most would ignore. I love my fellow psychonauts and the hilarious parallel dimensions we traveled through, and I loved G. as soon as he popped back into my timeline.

this life I’m gonna have myself a real good time with people. A grand life of it all, an abundant journey of love. A family dinner, a rush, a glance, a touch, a dance, a look in somebody’s eyes to light up the skies and open the world and send it reeling, a voice that says I’ll be here and you’ll be alright, an ecstasyful pool, a record of shooting stars, a film of adventures, a show of racing cars, tigers leaping through the sky traveling at the speed of light, excited particles of atomic rays, a rat-tat-tat on my heart.

i give and receive without expectations. I see the world with curiosity and awe.

i love the all, the all of you.