I spent a large portion of my December watching romantic comedies. I’m not particularly cheesy or mushy (he he) but it is an uncontested fact that Christmas truly is the most romantic season of the year. Valentine’s ain’t got nothing on it.

It’s the lights, the chill in the air, wrapped presents under the tree, a heightened sense of family, the long string of grand celebrations and a collective excitement shared by people who dare to hope again.

While the shopping frenzy continues outside my window and the whole city goes to corporate chaos, I hide under warm blankets and open my heart to love stories.

Here’s a list of everything I’ve watched so far: Love Actually, The Holiday, No Strings Attached, Sex And the City: Love and Labels, She’s the Man, Keeping the Faith, A Walk to Remember, Arthur, Little Manhattan, You’ve Got Mail and When Harry Met Sally. (By the time this gets published, Easy A would have belonged to that long inglorious list. Yeah, I have a lot of free time these days. No judging!)

Here is the embarrassing conclusion I’ve come to after staying up late to marathon formulaic Ashton Kutcher movies:

I miss falling in love.

There. I said it.

I miss the quickened beating of hearts, the explosion of emotions, the closeness; I miss the intimacy, the conjoined futures and the burning ember of that thing known as possibility. It got to a point where I secretly started getting a tiny bit depressed about being single for the holidays.

And then I realized that I had spent far too much time hoping I would find love this Christmas that I had forgotten something far greater: that I could be love.

Or perhaps, more pertinently, that I am love.

It is really easy to get lost in the hype of couple-y, sensational romance. People do it all the time. But Christmas wasn’t meant to be a slap in the face to the lonely. In fact, Christmas is really all about relationships.

My family and I have received different gifts from interesting political figures, long time acquaintances, relatives living abroad, dear friends, colleagues and a neighbor we have never once interacted with. It’s like the Universe is telling us that no matter how bad (or good) the year went, we weren’t alone in it. We created connections and built bridges and for them, we can be nothing else but grateful.

The underlying message of Christmas, I think, is that people matter. 

We spend most of the year consumed by school and career and, yes, even the crazy pursuit of romance when all around us, love abounds. Love is the person who walked you through your messy breakup. The person who held your hand in the hospital. The person who read your blog and told you that you were making a difference. Love is the person who believed in you even when you couldn’t seem to believe in yourself. The person who took you to that incredibly fancy dinner place just so they could spend some time with you. The person who remained on your side when everyone else jumped ship. The person — the people — who went out and actually did life together with you. And though they may seem like mere flesh, bone, and blood, the heartbeat that steps alongside your own is always, always, a miracle. Nothing less.

People matter to you, people matter to me, people matter to God. And maybe Christmas is a time when we can actually go celebrate and, for once – in a year seasoned with either merriment or misery – let the things that really do matter, matter.

So, this Christmas, I wish you love. Lots of it.

Or, perhaps, more than that, a great awareness of a love that seeps through every single pore of your existence.

As for me, there is no Ryan Gosling, waiting to kiss me under a non-existent mistletoe. But I can snuggle under warm blankets, with a puppy by my side, knowing that, while I’m not in love, because I am loved, I am always in Love.

A very merry Christmas to all of you. <3

Love,

Isa