Lately, I’ve been thinking about the timing of encounters, how some people come into our lives when the timing feels almost right, but never quite is.
I was in Edinburg in the summer of 2025 for the Fringe Festival. I had the time of my life. For context, the festival is an artsy one, filled with more than 3500 performances from theatre to musicals to standups, and the events are ongoing in ever corner of the city. On one of the standup shows I had booked to see, I chatted with a guy while queuing. We also saw each other on the way out after the show and he invited me to dinner. I said yes, and went on a date with a man who carried some weight of heartbreak in his eyes ( which I only noticed later because I was laughing so hard during the show). He was fresh out of a breakup, caught in a custody battle for his child, and yet he showed up to dinner with a kind of brutal honesty that startled me.
Somewhere between the laughter and the food, he looked at me and said:
“If you lived here, I wouldn’t let you go.”
It was one of those sentences that lodges itself in your chest. He wasn’t promising forever, he wasn’t weaving fantasies. He was simply telling me what he felt, in that exact moment. And it shook me, because I realized what I truly want isn’t grand gestures or fireworks. What I want is safety. The feeling that someone sees me, claims me, and means it. He was not that person, but I was grateful for the realisation.
I am not a stranger to that, the instant infatuation that allows one to build a whole future around. It’s momentary, intoxicating and transports you to another dimension. And because I know better, I don’t onboard that flight, and opt to miss it instead.
That same summer, and exactly one week later, in London, I met someone, a friend of a friend. I cannot explain it, but from the very first moment, I felt safe with him. We had met one time before in a different city, but this time was different, this safety was different. Softer. Less dramatic. He didn’t say much, but being around him felt like exhaling after holding my breath for too long.
And yet, there was a catch. He was younger. Six years younger. He spoke of wanting a family someday, and I couldn’t shake the thought that my age might stand in his way. Pursuing anything felt like intruding on someone who had his own clear plans for the future.
For a while, I have lived in the rush of beginnings. The spark, the love-bomb phase where everything feels thrilling and possible. But I don’t seem to cross into the steadier side , the side that feels safe enough to stay.
These encounters left me wondering: is love really about meeting the right person, or is it about meeting someone at the right time? Because sometimes the connection is there, the pull is undeniable, yet life , its timing, its logistics, its expectations , gets in the way.
And what is that I can do? Should I just embrace the chaos? Let myself fall into the moments of infatuation, knowing they might not last? Or should I hold out for the person who would fight to keep me around, no matter the timing, no matter the obstacles?
As always, I have no answers. I can only draw a picture of what my ” NOW” looks like. Right now, I am sitting with the uncertainty, and I really am sitting with it. I am meeting people where they are, in the middle of their journeys. And maybe, just maybe, in the middle of mine too.
