For my Mino.The notion of "summer" suddenly hit me today on the train back home in the form of a creamy and delicious 6-foot blond intern came back from his day (and gym - obviously!) in a sleeveless shirt torn to the lower seam, revealing a beautifully tanned and toned torso. View like that is the plus side of the Washingtonian summer, when out of nowhere, the city is flooded with bright young things, hoping to make it here some day. They reminded me of some not-so-distant past when I was still in college, wondering what the real life would be like.
These memories had come back to me just a few days before, on a midnight train headed toward NYC as Mino and I reflected on all the changes we had gone through in the few years being friends. There we were, two twenty-something year-olds, still looking for Labels and dreaming of a big Love - but in our eyes, there's already a gleam of reality. We knew now that it took a lot of hard work to afford labels, that real love shouldn't feel like compromises, but also that there was more to life than the two big L's above. Most of all, we knew now that the quest for labels, love, and life required us to look within ourselves to search for the true essence and beauty that wouldn't need approval from anyone.
The hard part is that each of us is going at a different pace - so Dear us, here's to hope that one day we would all see each other at the finish line.
Photo credit: Between Worlds by Eugene Donohoe
