Music and I are in a relationship

Music is my 19-year-old boyfriend who picked me up from college and took me to a different restaurant every Saturday - and - tucked my hair behind my ear as I ate sizzler. Music is also the sauve man I dated who listened to my 5-year plan - feeding my soul and body with a penetrating stare and his to-die-for smile. Music is also the man who betrayed me and left me in the lurch - and - made me fall every time I tried to take a step forward.

Music is love, lust and betrayal all rolled into one.

I have lived more in the songs I have listened to than through the highs and lows of life. In the dead of winter last January, I missed my bus and had to wait for another bus for 40 minutes in -15 degrees celsius. I shivered in sub-zero weather. With anger seething in my body, warmth was given by Ed Sheeran's Beautiful People. I wondered was Ed was singing for me? Because I don't fit in this world. Because, at that time, I could definitely use some help. Perhaps a ride. Perhaps enough money in the bank to afford Uber. Ed helped me to survive that brutal evening in Toronto. Ed gave me company when I had no one. Ed gave me hope.

I have lost count of times I've lulled myself to sleep with Ranjish Hi Sahi by Ali Sethi. I don't know if the lyrics make my loneliness more pronounced or fill my empty life. I don't even know if I am waiting for someone. Or I want someone to come back. The only thing I know is if I ever fall in love, I want to feel pain like Ali sings. I want to wait for my lover. And I want him to come back and destroy me all over again. Love, in this song, has layers that transcend worldly expectations. Some days, I want something like that in my life too. 

I was on a flight when I heard Treat You Better by Shawn Mendes for the first time. I cried so much that I felt the Alps over which I was flying would drown in my tears. It reminded me of the only man who treated me right and loved me despite all the wrongs in my life. But at that time, I wanted to do everything alone. The woman in me wanted to restore self-respect, not fall in the arms of a man. Even if he was the man who embraced the broken pieces of me and hurt himself in return. It was heartbreaking but I had to let him go. Letting him go became my only regret. I listen to this song very rarely now. But when I do, I think of the love I lost and the courage I gained. I also think of him.

Music gives me the taste of emotions which I craved in every relationship. It makes my life lonelier. It makes my regrets prominent. It makes my heart heavier with pain. Yet music remains by my side everyone else leaves.

No wonder, music and I are in a relationship.