Dust-Kissed but treasured

It’s funny how after 3 years of owning this lamp, today is about the fifth time I’m turning it on, and that’s even because of this #kiss.

For a very long time, I believed I was troublesome and deserved every bad thing that happened to me until I met this guy. Prior to meeting him, I was very quick to give up, accepted failure, and agreed that I deserved to be at rock bottom.

We were acquaintances for years but eventually became friends after we were assigned to the same project at work. I remember that particular day when I got that call from my brother. We had just come back from lunch and kept laughing about something funny we saw on the way.

After receiving the call, I broke down in tears in front of him and started talking about how bad things happened to me all the time because I’m a bad person, I’m not enough, and the universe hates me. Oh boy, I said a lot of things that day. (You can’t blame me; the news of losing my elder sister had broken me)

Without knowing why I was even crying, he looked at me and told me he wished I knew how much I light up a room. “In a room of darkness, your presence, your smile, your persona, and your resilience become like an opened window to bring in light. And in a room of light, you make the brightness quite blinding.” At that particular moment, all that he was sounded gibberish, because I was very hurt, but those words got stuck with me.

So one day, as I stood at the mall shopping for groceries, I came across that lamp. It had been turned on that time, and each glance at it reminded me of my friend’s words. As I looked at it, I realized it was one of the most beautiful lamps I had ever seen. It was a ceramic lamp, painted in white and had floral carvings all around. Going closer made me feel that I was indeed and will always be light. And if there’s one thing light does, it is to triumph over darkness each and every time. Right in that moment, I knew that lamp had to go home with me.

off	on

The funny thing is I never use this lamp for anything. It’s always on my table looking at me, and to be very honest, I mostly forget it even exists. Most times, it’s when I get a visitor and they ask, “Oh, what’s this for?” before I remember it exists and turn it on for them to see. And other times, when I’m going through some dark phase and need to remind myself that I am indeed light.

Over the years, I’ve realized that I always want to put something on the beautiful words I hear, which get stuck with me. You know? Something to make it make sense. Anytime someone who means a lot to me professes heavy words that comfort me, I tend to put a physical signature on it by getting something to represent it. And although it started as unconscious practice, it has eventually become a repeated pattern in my life.

And to be very honest, I’m glad it’s not just material things. Sometimes I treat myself to nice dinners, cinema nights, or a full day at the beach after hearing “Well done, great job for achieving this or you’re a very strong woman” And I love that for me because it would have been very problematic for me as a minimalist who hates to have a lot of things in her space to keep collecting stuff.

Images are mine