Chance Encounters

We often find things when we aren't really looking for them, isn't it? In places we don't expect to find them. In people, people we never hoped for them from. You get what I mean, don't you?

I mean, a few years back, I remember being part of conversations where music was a hot topic. And even as I rattled off the names of the oldies goldies, and nodded along to "approved" Billboard Hot 100 songs (with performative fervour, mind you), it all seemed quite academic to me. But then, in 2015, bored at an airport, waiting to board a flight to nowhere special, I downloaded this app off the Playstore. Finger dancing over guitar strings to songs I'd never heard (or, heard and forgotten, you know how it is), I found musicality in my life.

And this isn't a one-off either. In 2016, on a hike I was dragged to by my then-partner (quite unwillingly, really, and yet with the hope of finding something special, you know?), I found art in sunsets. Not the kind decorating my "home" laptop (you know, because "work" prefers it when their logo looms on your screen—and life—instead). The kind that are real, the ones I can almost touch; only if I look up from the screen once in a while (but, well, you know how it is).

I've found so much in these chance encounters. Shy and uncomfortable in my skin—a feeling that's growing by the minute—I found a way to lose my inhibitions by getting lost in the crowds at dancing bars. This one's a funny story, actually. Two girlfriends (are you really friends, though, if you never talk about life?) and I had hit a bar after work. 2018, I think. A few spins on the dance floor later, they went to grab drinks and...didn't return (oh yeah, they apologised the next morning, something about one of them "feeling" ill. We're still friends, of course). Alone, I felt some of my facade melt away. Some momentary peace, you can call it.

Chance Encounters

In countless moments when I least expected it, I've found something to treasure. Something I owned and lost, or never knew I needed but desperately do. So, it's these chance encounters that make me feel hopeful. Hopeful that, maybe, one day, I'll find happiness by chance too. You get what I mean, don't you?