how strange life is

it’s strange how fast everything can shift. one day feels unbearable, heavy in every corner, and then somehow the next is laced with something good- something i didn’t expect. it almost feels unfair, how sadness can sit beside joy, like they’re two sides of the same coin i keep flipping without knowing what will land.

i think about how long i’ve been waiting, how many years i’ve spent whispering into the dark, tossing wishes at stars, at bridges, at numbers and eyelashes. and then suddenly, the thing i prayed for shows up. not in the way i thought it would, not wrapped in trumpets and bright lights, but quietly. like it had been circling me all along, waiting for me to finally be ready.

it still amazes me how pain can disguise itself as protection, how what feels like punishment sometimes turns out to be mercy in a costume i couldn’t recognize at the time. two days- that’s all it took for everything to feel different. the things i thought were impossible slid into place so naturally, it almost felt like they were never miracles at all, just inevitabilities waiting their turn.

and then, at 10pm, my phone lights up. my best friend, telling me she's proud of me out of the blue. it shouldn’t feel like much, just a text, but it does. it feels like warmth pressed into my chest, like being seen when i thought i was invisible. it feels like proof that even the darkest nights can hold something soft, something worth holding onto.