have i held enough space?

on the fine line between love and obsession

I sit in my childhood bedroom, books stacked up and strewn across the floor. They’re living memories of the worlds I immersed myself in, read over and over until the covers frayed and the bindings softened. I haven’t opened them in years, a layer of dust sits on top of them, but my memories of reading them are shiny and fresh. There are smudges on the wall, ink stains that bled off of movie posters and magazine pull-outs that used to live around my bedroom, reminders that even if I tore them off the wall, they’ll always be with me.

I have never loved casually. There’s something within me, an indescribable force that clings so desperately and tightly to everything, as if afraid that if I let go for a second everything I love will change beyond recognition. I could go back through my life, flip through each year as easily as turning pages, and pinpoint exact moments where I found a new object of attention— a book, a movie, a person— something to infiltrate every waking thought and captivate my entire being.

Paul and I walked to the grocery store the other day and our neighbor’s cat ran up to greet us, slinking around our ankles and purring when we pet him. As we walked away, I found myself irrationally emotional; I was in my head creating a backstory for this cat I had known for about 5 seconds. I worried that he was cold or hungry, even though the rational part of my brain knew for a fact that his owners brought him in at night. I told Paul about my cat-induced anxiety, asking if maybe we should leave the cat (I named him Chester in my head) some food or something. He hugged me and reminded me that we knew the owners and that Chester would be okay.

“You form attachments so quickly and hold on to them so tightly,” Paul told me as the quick and familiar feeling began to sink in. I know it’s true, I almost immediately want to tie myself to the things I want to love. Over and over, I ask myself if what I feel is love or if it’s some combination of anxiety and obsession, coming together to form something warped and twisted, albeit strong and passionate. I’m constantly tiptoeing that line, staggering as I put one foot in front of the other, precariously balanced, always wondering if I’ll fall on one side or the other.

So many of my earliest recollections of this intense, almost overpowering love are tied into books. I was awkward as a child, I had an easier time connecting with books than people. I read The Hunger Games when I was 11, around the same time as the movie’s release, and it infiltrated my every thought. I had t-shirts, posters, and collectibles; I went to the midnight showing of the movie. I read the books over and over, I still have the first page of the first book memorized, and each time I would curl up in the huge white chair in my living room and read it, I felt my love grow stronger. Even now, I’m twelve years older and distant from that part of my life, but as I write and I think about this, I feel myself longing to watch a Hunger Games movie or re-read the book.

I couldn’t relate to many of my classmates during that time. They loved The Hunger Games and I loved The Hunger Games, but my love turned into obsession. I remember sitting on my iPod touch, hesitantly clicking the Safari browser and searching for The Hunger Games content until I ended up on Tumblr. My introduction to fandom spaces allowed me to realize that for the first time, I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only one going crazy with the love and obsession at war with each other in my heart.

Even now, the books I read and fall in love with have some kind of power over me. I can’t help myself from allowing them to suck me in. Something about the words on the page just means everything to me, I find myself over and over while reading them, there’s nothing that feels impossible while reading a good book. I’ve grown and matured, I’ve told myself that I’ve outgrown the part of me that clings to a book, movie, or TV show like it’s my entire world that lies dormant within me, but I know that’s a lie.

from pinterest but taylor ate with this lyric

When I was in middle school, I was introduced to Wicked for the first time, it quickly dominated the cycle of love and obsession. As I listened to the soundtrack, read the book, and convinced my parents to take me to the show, I thought that maybe this wasn’t a lifetime love, it was a passing whim, something I would look back at in 10 years and laugh at. I’m sure you can guess this next sentence. I thought I got over it, that I got it all out of my system and processed that obsession before moving on to another one, but last week I watched the new Wicked movie and fell right back into my 14-year-old self’s mind. Suddenly I was driving to the soundtrack, recollecting the weirdest plot details from the book, and joking with Julia about our favorite parts of the musical.

This week has been something of a reckoning for me. I’ve spent a long time thinking about my relationship with the media I loved/obsessed over as a tween, and it’s so obvious that while I’ll always feel the innate need to attach myself strongly to the things that I love, I no longer let them consume my life. I love Wicked, I’ll probably always have a special place in my heart for it, but it no longer consumes every waking thought. I love to love. I have so much room within me to keep adding to that collection, carving out space for everything and everyone that’s profoundly touched me, but I no longer feel the pull toward obsession.

Obsession or not, my love can never be calm or casual. I love so hard because I want that in return. I think the reason my obsessions and my need to immerse my every moment with the things I love have dissipated, is because I finally know how loved I am. Paul loves me. He loves that I attach sentimental meaning to the smallest moments in our lives and that I find myself overwhelmed with the love bursting from my heart. I don’t know if he realizes that I constantly forget that I’ve fixated on something to love the moment I see him smile and me and take my hand. How could I obsess or lose myself in something when I have him? I’m grateful to have someone worthy of holding all of the love I have.

Maybe this post is just a love letter to holding that space within you to love, but I think at its heart it’s for the girl who sat in her bedroom and found solace and love in books. I ask myself every day if I’ll grow out of it, the all-consuming, never-ending love. If I’ll forget book plots, song lyrics, and names and faces of the people and stories that have taken a piece of my heart, and regardless of if I will or won’t, I don’t want to.

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thank you for everything

with love,

sarah 💌

ps: weekly favorites

• spending time at home with my family

• cooking thanksgiving foods

• Elle
  and
  faith zapata

• the wicked movie but also the gladiator movie because of my longtime love for paul mescal

• my sad winter music playlist