Love actually comes when you least expect it. It comes when you feel like you don’t deserve it or when you don’t even want it. Love comes when you are sitting on a park bench and you make eye contact with a random stranger who months later turns into your soul mate. It comes from a dating app that you say you go on “just for fun”. Love comes when you are at the lowest point in your life and you see no way out. Love doesn’t just come from your significant other, it comes from your family, from your dog, from your best friend. It comes all around, when you least expect it.

It’s a Tuesday night and instead of doing the work that you need to have done your sitting at the bar with half a glass full of whatever drink your friend ordered. She’s sitting next to you talking the ear off to the guy next to you when all you keep thinking about is your comfy pajamas, couch, and wanting to finish that TV series. It’s been months since your last break up and you aren’t quite sure if getting into the dating pool is for you just yet. You’ve been on a couple dates, some that were perfectly okay; other’s that were totally horrendous and something you want to delete from your memory. Dating is so hard in this time, between social media, plastic surgery, and dating apps, it’s hard to find someone who’s wanting to be serious. Someone who wants to just have a relaxing night in and not have to go drinking all the time. You know for you it’s ten times harder because of the depression you have. Something you were diagnosed with a couple months ago. Your therapist claims that it’s normal, that everyone in their life goes through this. Sometimes it takes a change in your life or a traumatic experience for this to happen. Other times, it’s a chemical imbalance and you can’t control it. Fortunately for you, it’s both. You hate going into detail about what’s going on in your life and why it happened so you sum it up in a couple words, “shit happens”. Your best friend though knows the whole story and has tried everything to help you. She set you up on that stupid dating app you see no reason in but have fun swiping left and right. She also begs you to go out with her every once in awhile to be social. But you still don’t have fun, you sit there letting the ice in your drink melt as you watch strangers around you have the best time. As the night goes on people start to leave home with each other, some who came together and others who just met. Meanwhile, you sit there alone while your friend has escaped off to the dance floor with mysterious man. Your watch reads 1 o’clock and you know it’s time to go home. You grab your bag, giving the bartender the cash for the drink and head out not even bothering looking for your friend. The walk outside was a nice refresher as the cool air hits you from the rain earlier that night. Your apartment is only two blocks away so the walk is always nice. On your walk home, that stupid app dings on your phone alerting you of a message. You unlock your phone and swipe it open revealing a message from a guy named, Jason. You scroll through his profile and notice Jason is cute but doesn’t have much to say. His message to you is like any other you message receive, “Hey cutie!”. Something you’ve had said to you a million times. You reply back like you usually do and continue on with your walk. Most of these conversations end quickly and you never hear from them again and you continue on with your life. It’s not easy taking something like this so seriously but you do it anyways to keep yourself entertained.

The messages keep coming, weeks of communicating back and forth and getting to know Jason. You learn he’s freshly out of a relationship too and find him to be a little bit more emotional than you are. He’s also though, someone you never would’ve expected to meet. He’s things you have wanted to see in a guy and things that surprise you. You don’t tell your friend afraid that something this good has to end quickly. But it doesn’t, you keep communicating all day and night getting to know someone new and feeling the past slip away. He asks you after a month of talking to meet-up. You hesitate for you never really have met someone from online and fear that your expectations won’t be met in real life. What if you don’t like the in person Jason like you do with Jason through phone. But you agree feeling this is the step in the right direction. You both agree on coffee at 3 o’clock at the local Starbucks tomorrow and you start to get nervous. But you do it anyways because you know it’s right. You spend hours the next day picking out the right outfit to see him wanting to set a good impression but not too much of a strong one to think you’re trying too hard. It’s 2:45 and time for you to start heading over. You tell your friend you’re going on a date and you’ll be back and head down the street. Once you reach the door you open it to find Jason sitting at a table by himself with his cup of coffee and one next to him. You hesitate wondering if it’s for someone else and if this was a bad idea. He looks over and smiles standing up waving. You walk over relieved he is everything like his pictures and more. You give him a hug and then sit down feeling your heart race a hundred minutes. This never happens before, most dates in the first seconds of seeing each other you’ve made up your mind that this won’t work. This time though, your mind feels like it will and you feel at peace. He hands you the extra cup of coffee saying he ordered something that he thought you might like and surprisingly got your drink order right. An hour turns into two, which turns into four and you don’t even realize you’ve been talking for ever. Talking to him is like talking to someone you’ve known your whole life. You don’t know where this relationship will take you but you do know that you will let love in again. It won’t be easy like the flip of the switch because battling depressing is never that way. Trying to find love again is never easy. You never expected that meeting someone on some dumb dating app would actually work but it did.

Love comes in all different ways, you happened to find it in this way. Your therapist believes that this is good for you and taking baby steps in this new relationship is okay. You don’t know if you and Jason will be together for a while or a short time, but you do know that it’s okay to begin again that’s what love is all about; letting someone in when you least expect it.