I am the one who didn’t know how to love, and I’m no longer ashamed to say it.
We met in the simplest way: mutual friends, casual conversations. Nothing dramatic. Back then, I was a contained mess, trying to keep everything under control because it was the only way I knew how to move forward.
Love seemed like a scam to me. Something people used to hurt each other and then blamed fate for it. I saw it everywhere—people destroying themselves in the name of love—and I swore to myself that I would never be one of them again.
So I learned to run. To keep my distance. To convince myself that love was for the weak, for those who didn’t know how to be alone. And for a while, it worked. Or so I thought. The emptiness was still there, growing every time I refused to feel.
When I did allow myself to love, I did so from chaos. From the turmoil I refused to acknowledge. I obsessed, I lost myself in stories that only existed in my head, I became everything I swore I never would: the intense one, the one who didn’t know how to set boundaries, the one who felt too much.
I spent years torturing myself with what ifs. Replaying every scene, every message, every moment where I could have acted differently. I hated myself for not being better, for not knowing how to control my emotions, for being too much… everything.
But time and therapy taught me that there are no shortcuts to learning how to love (yourself). That every mistake led me here. That all those past versions of myself, no matter how chaotic, were necessary to reach this peace.
And then we met. He appeared—not as a magical solution, not as a savior—but as someone who simply chose to stay. Someone who wasn’t scared of my broken parts. Who never asked me to be different.
Now, love is something else. It’s being able to breathe without feeling like I’m drowning. It’s not having to measure every word, every gesture. It’s existing without asking for permission.
Sometimes I think about that past version of myself, the one who believed she was broken and unforgivable. The one who thought she had to earn the right to be loved. The one who mistook drama for passion and believed that love had to hurt to be real.
If I could talk to her, I’d tell her that every step of the journey was worth it. That her mistakes don’t define her. That she deserved to be loved even when she didn’t know how to love herself. That peace didn’t come from the perfect love, but from the love she learned to give herself.
Soy la que no sabía amar, y ya no me avergüenza decirlo.
Nos conocimos de la forma más simple: personas en común, charlas casuales. Nada dramático. En ese entonces, yo era un desastre contenido, tratando de mantener todo bajo control porque era la única forma que conocía de seguir adelante.
El amor me parecía una estafa. Algo que la gente usaba para lastimarse y luego culpar al destino. Lo veía en todas partes: personas destruyéndose en nombre del amor, y me prometía a mí misma que nunca más sería una de ellas.
Así que aprendí a huir. A poner distancia. A convencerme de que el amor era para los débiles, para los que no saben estar solos. Y por un tiempo, me funcionó. O eso creía. El vacío seguía ahí, creciendo cada vez que me negaba a sentir.
Cuando alguna vez me permití amar, lo hice desde el caos. Desde el trastorno que no quería aceptar. Me obsesioné, me perdí en historias que solo existían en mi cabeza, me convertí en todo lo que juré que nunca iba a ser: la intensa, la que no sabe poner límites, la que siente demasiado.
Pasé años torturándome con los “¿y si hubiera…?”. Repasando cada escena, cada mensaje, cada momento en el que podría haber actuado diferente. Me odiaba por no haber sido mejor, por no haber sabido controlar mis emociones, por haber sido demasiado… todo.
Pero el tiempo y la terapia me enseñaron que no hay atajos para aprender a querer(se). Que cada error me trajo hasta acá. Que todas esas versiones de mí, por más caóticas que fueran, eran necesarias para llegar a esta paz.
Entonces nos conocimos. Apareció él, no como una solución mágica, ni un salvador; sino como alguien que simplemente eligió quedarse. Que no se asustó con mis partes rotas. Que no exigió que fuera diferente.
Ahora el amor es otra cosa. Es poder respirar sin sentir que me ahogo. Es no tener que medir cada palabra, cada gesto. Es existir sin pedir permiso.
A veces pienso en esa versión anterior de mí, la que se creía rota e imperdonable. La que pensaba que tenía que ganarse el derecho a ser querida. La que confundía drama con pasión y creía que el amor tenía que doler para ser real.
Si pudiera hablar con ella, le diría que cada paso del camino valió la pena. Que sus errores no la definen. Que merecía ser amada incluso cuando no sabía amarse a sí misma. Que la paz no llegó con el amor perfecto, sino con el amor que aprendió a darse.
Pasé 3 años de mi vida en Vermont. La mayor parte del tiempo deseando irme, siendo honesta. El desarraigo me pesaba mucho y todo se sentía tan efímero que me desesperaba. Las relaciones se formaban y disolvían en cuestión de meses, la gente rotaba con las estaciones, y de alguna manera se sentía como si la vida allí pusiera el mundo en pausa. Las horas se hacían eternas por la falta de luz y las temperaturas heladas podían mantenerte solo en tu casa por días.
Así y todo, de a poco y con paciencia llegué a encontrar espacios que me hicieron sentir myself again. Exploré la vuelta a la vida universitaria, conocí personas que me cambiaron la vida y me reencontré con pasiones olvidadas. Y no fue hasta que logré sentirme cómoda con mi entorno, que llegó el momento de partir. Casi como si quedara liberada luego de aprender una lección: construir mi hogar donde sea que esté.
Hoy escribo desde Florida, de vuelta en el lugar donde viví hace más de veinte años y a donde jamás imaginé volver, pero en circunstancias completamente distintas. Hoy mi familia me acompaña, ya no estoy sola.
No extraño Vermont, siendo sincera. Si bien el lugar llegó a encantarme con sus coloridos otoños y sus mágicas primeras nevadas del invierno, hoy siento que es un capítulo cerrado de mi vida. Fue un lugar muy especial que tuve la fortuna de conocer y al que espero volver a visitar en algún momento; y aunque echo de menos los lazos que logré formar, I’m so ready for what’s to come.
I spent 3 years of my life in Vermont. Most of the time I wanted to leave, to be honest. The uprootedness weighed heavily on me and everything felt so ephemeral that I despaired. Relationships formed and dissolved in a matter of months, people rotated with the seasons, and somehow it felt like life there put the world on pause. The hours were made endless by the lack of light and the freezing temperatures could keep you home alone for days.
Still, little by little and with patience I found spaces that made me feel myself again. I explored the return to university life, met people who changed my life and rediscovered forgotten passions. And it wasn’t until I became comfortable with my surroundings that it was time to leave. It was almost as if I was liberated after learning a lesson: to make my home wherever I am.
Today I am writing from Florida, back in the place where I lived more than twenty years ago and where I never imagined I would return, but under completely different circumstances. Today my family is with me, I am no longer alone.
I don’t miss Vermont, to be honest. Although I came to love the place with its colourful autumns and magical first snowfalls of winter, today I feel that it is a closed chapter in my life. It was a very special place that I was fortunate enough to know and hope to revisit at some point; and while I miss the bonds I managed to form, I’m so ready for what’s to come.
Two years ago, I took a train from Burlington, Vermont, to Manhattan, New York. It was a seven-hour journey. This was my second time visiting. The first time, I had said goodbye to a friend forever; this time, I was reuniting with a friend of many years.
Flor and I met in Monte Grande, in the Province of Buenos Aires, when we were about 11 or 12 years old. We went to different schools—she in Guillón and I in Monte Grande—but we both loved tap dancing and met at a local studio (forever in our hearts, IDAC).
Since then, we’ve been friends. We’re still friends, although for a moment during the trip, I thought everything had stayed in Argentina. And in part, it had. A piece of me stayed in Buenos Aires the day I left, and discovering that was what made this trip so special.
As we approached New York, the views of New England from the train window became more and more urban. This filled me with mixed emotions: on one hand, I was leaving my new home; on the other, I was venturing into the city to reconnect with a
part of my past. I was very excited, though also quite anxious (though, honestly, I’m always anxious).
I arrived at Penn Station around 6 p.m., and Flor was arriving from Washington almost an hour later. By the time the train stopped and I walked to where she was (obviously, on the other end of the station), time had passed, and we arrived almost simultaneously. Meeting up was a bit complicated, but there we were, in the city we had promised to visit together one day. And something felt… strange.
I cried. Seeing a familiar and kind face after a year and a half in Vermont filled me with joy, but also with questions. Who were we really at that moment? We were no longer who we had been 18 months ago; we were different people. It felt like meeting someone for the first time, with the peculiarity that we were old acquaintances. “Were,” a key word.
We started our journey to the room we rented in a Brooklyn apartment, which took about 40 minutes. We took the subway, which then turned into a train. We walked and finally arrived. It wasn’t what we wanted, but at least it was cheap. We were in New York, and that was all that mattered.
We dropped off our things, changed, and went out again to eat, drink, see comedians, and catch up. Going back to sleep was when things got tense because we started talking about our lives in recent months, and as much as I wished it weren’t true, the nightmares from back then were real. The conversation became emotional, and without saying a word, we both realized that something had changed, but we still didn’t understand what.
The rest of the trip was quite fulfilling: we walked through Times Square, strolled through Central Park, saw Funny Girl and Wicked on Broadway, greeted Lea Michele outside the theater… We did everything we would have wanted to do in our teenage years, when we spent weekends absorbed in musicals, popcorn, movies, and endless conversations about who we wanted to be in the future and all the plans we wanted to carry out.
But of course, we were no longer those teenagers. By then, we were adults, with established lives, developed personalities, rising careers, and a thousand worries in our heads. Now we had lived a bit more, had experiences that shaped us in different directions, and didn’t quite know how to handle it. Neither of us could express it either, not until months later.
Finally, the time came to say goodbye. Flor went to the airport while I headed to an event I was informed about at the last minute. The farewell was strange; it felt like there were things left unsaid, but it wasn’t the moment for that—it would come. We knew we would talk again, so we decided to let it be.
I stayed in the city a few more days. I visited the Stonewall bar, the Brooklyn Zoo, walked the bridge, shopped at the Harry Potter store, and, of course, saw My Chemical Romance live for the first time. It was incredible. That trip had everything my teenage self would have wanted, and more, because now I could enjoy my freedom and decision-making power, answering to no will but my own. It was a truly unique experience.
Returning to Vermont, a new life awaited me, a life I had eagerly anticipated since I arrived. I was starting a job at a college that would allow me to study and open doors to a world I had never imagined (but always hoped) to belong to, while also meeting those who would become my chosen family.
Three months passed; things changed and kept me busy, with little contact with others. Until one day, I received an email. It was from Flor, and in summary, it said: Hi friend!
It took me a while to send you these photos. It’s not 100% because I was lazy, but because it was hard for me to look at them again. I only looked at some on December 31st, I said, “this is the moment,” and here I am.
That trip was very important to me; it meant a lot. It opened many things, but it also closed many others.
We traveled, saw each other after so long, and although everything is fine between us, I noticed that we are not on the same wavelength. Maybe you felt it too. And it doesn’t scare me at all. Time has passed, distance has passed, and although we are not in the same place today, you will always be a part of me.
Even though this feeling hurts me, I am at peace, because even though we are not connecting today, there is something that will always be latent.
Thank you for everything, always.
Receiving that message was everything I needed to ground what I had been thinking about while trying to adjust to my new life.
I took a few days to reread the email and think about my response. And, in summary, I wrote: Hi friend!
I’d like to start by thanking you for sending me this email.
Yes, I agree with you: the trip opened some things and closed others. And I’m also at peace with that.
It’s no news to either of us to say that we both have changed. We’ve grown a lot in recent years, and in slightly different directions. In my case, emigrating transformed me almost from the root, and that was what I sought when I made the decision; I wanted to transform my reality, and I did. I imagine the same for you, only you chose another path. And I don’t see that as something negative at all.
With the anguish that every change brings, I realized that many of the things that united us when we were kids, I now associate with a version of myself that no longer exists. Becoming aware
of the loss of that part of my identity hurt a lot, but it also brought things that make me incredibly happy today.
Be certain that I will also always be here for you whenever you need me.
Thank you for everything.
Today, two years later, Flor and I are still friends. We talk every now and then, catch up, and continue with our lives. But we always know that the other is just a message away.
And maybe growing up is that. Maybe for some, growing up means seeing your friends once every two years and creating memories that last a lifetime, with the certainty that they will always be there when you want and can. Maybe growing up has to do with developing the confidence that the other person exists in our lives even if we are not physically close. Maybe growing up has to do with realizing that love is wishing for the other’s happiness, wherever they may be.
Hace dos años viajé en tren desde Burlington, Vermont, hasta Manhattan, New York. Era la segunda vez que iba. En la primera, me despedí de un amigo para siempre; en esta, iba a reencontrarme con una amiga de años.
Flor y yo nos conocimos en Monte Grande, en la Provincia de Buenos Aires, cuando teníamos unos 11 o 12 años. Íbamos a colegios distintos, ella en Guillón y yo en Monte Grande, pero a las dos nos gustaba el tap, y nos conocimos bailando en un estudio de la zona (por siempre en el cora, IDAC).
Desde entonces somos amigas. Seguimos siendo amigas, aunque por un momento en el viaje pensé que todo se había quedado en Argentina. Y en parte sí. Un pedazo de mí se quedó en Buenos Aires el día en que me fui, y descubrir eso es lo que hizo a este viaje tan especial.
A medida que nos acercábamos a Nueva York, las vistas de New England por la ventana del tren se volvían cada vez más urbanas. Eso me llenó de emociones mixtas: por un lado, me alejaba de mi nueva casa; por otro, me aventuraba en la ciudad para encontrarme con una parte de mi pasado. Estaba muy emocionada, aunque también bastante ansiosa (aunque, honestamente, siempre estoy ansiosa).
Llegué a Penn Station cerca de las 6 de la tarde, y Flor llegaba desde Washington casi una hora después. Entre que el tren estacionó y caminé hasta donde ella estaba (en la otra punta de la estación, obvio), se pasó el tiempo y llegamos casi a la vez. Encontrarnos fue un poco complejo, pero ahí estábamos, en la ciudad que hacía años nos propusimos visitar juntas algún día. Y algo se sentía… raro.
Yo lloré. Ver una cara familiar y amable después del año y medio que pasé en Vermont me llenó de alegría, pero también de preguntas. ¿Quiénes éramos realmente en ese momento? Ya no éramos quienes fuimos 18 meses atrás; éramos otras personas. La sensación se asemejaba a conocer a alguien por primera vez, con la peculiaridad de que ya éramos viejas conocidas. “Éramos”, palabra clave.
Empezamos el camino a la habitación que alquilamos en un departamento de Brooklyn, lo que significó unos 40 minutos de viaje. Nos tomamos el subte, que luego se convirtió en tren. Caminamos y finalmente llegamos. No era lo que queríamos, pero al menos fue barato. Estábamos en Nueva York, y eso era todo lo que importaba.
Dejamos nuestras cosas, nos cambiamos y volvimos a salir, a comer, tomar, ver comediantes, y ponernos al día. La vuelta a dormir fue cuando todo se puso tenso, porque empezamos a hablar de nuestras vidas en los últimos meses, y aunque
quisiera que así no fuera, las pesadillas en aquel entonces fueron reales. La charla se puso emotiva, y sin decir nada, las dos nos dimos cuenta de que algo había cambiado, pero todavía no entendíamos qué.
El resto del viaje fue bastante completo: caminamos por Times Square, nos paseamos por Central Park, vimos Funny Girl y Wicked en Broadway, saludamos a Lea Michele afuera del teatro… Hicimos todo lo que hubiéramos querido hacer en nuestra adolescencia, cuando nos sumíamos en fines de semana de musicales, pochoclos, cine y charlas eternas sobre quiénes queríamos ser en el futuro y todos los planes que buscábamos ejecutar.
Pero claro, ya no éramos esas adolescentes. En ese momento ya éramos adultas, con vidas empezadas, con personalidades desarrolladas, carreras en alza y mil preocupaciones en la cabeza. Ahora habíamos vivido un poco más, teníamos experiencias que nos formaron en direcciones distintas, y no sabíamos muy bien cómo manejarlo. Ninguna supo expresarlo tampoco, hasta meses después.
Finalmente, llegó el momento de la despedida. Flor se fue al aeropuerto mientras yo me iba a un evento del que me avisaron a último momento. La despedida fue extraña, se sintió como si nos hubieran quedado cosas por decir, pero ese no era el momento, ya iba a llegar. Sabíamos que íbamos a volver a hablar, así que preferimos dejarlo ser.
Yo me quedé en la ciudad unos días más. Visité el bar Stonewall, el Zoológico de Brooklyn, caminé el puente, paseé por la tienda de Harry Potter, y ni más ni menos, vi a My Chemical Romance
en vivo por primera vez. Fue increíble. Ese viaje tuvo todo lo que mi yo adolescente hubiera querido, y más, porque ahora podía disfrutar de mi libertad y poder de decisión, obedeciendo ninguna voluntad más que la mía. Fue una experiencia muy única.
En la vuelta a Vermont me esperaba una nueva vida, una vida que esperé con ansias desde que llegué. Iba a empezar mi trabajo en un college, que me permitiría estudiar y que me abriría puertas a un mundo al que jamás imaginé (pero que siempre esperé) llegar a pertenecer, a la vez que conocería a quien se volvería mi familia elegida.
Pasaron tres meses, las cosas cambiaron y me mantuvieron ocupada, con poco contacto con otros seres. Hasta que un día, me llega un mail. Era de Flor, y resumidamente, decía:
¡Hola amiga!
Tardé en pasarte estas fotos. No es 100% por colgada, sino que me costó mucho verlas de nuevo. Recién el 31 de diciembre vi algunas, dije “es el momento”, y acá estoy.
Fue muy importante para mí ese viaje, significó mucho. Abrió muchas cosas, pero fue el cierre de muchas otras.
Viajamos, nos vimos después de tanto tiempo, y si bien todo está bien entre nosotras, noté que no estamos en la misma sintonía. Quizá vos lo sentiste también. Y no me asusta para nada. Pasó tiempo, pasó distancia, y aunque hoy no estemos en la misma vos siempre vas a estar en mí.
A pesar de que esta sensación me duela, estoy tranquila, porque aunque hoy no conectemos hay algo que siempre va a estar latente.
Gracias por todo, siempre.
Recibir ese mensaje fue para mí todo lo que necesitaba para aterrizar lo que había venido pensando a la vez que buscaba cómo acostumbrarme a mi nueva vida.
Me tomé unos días para releer el correo y pensar en mi respuesta. Y, resumidamente, escribí:
¡Hola amiga!
Me gustaría empezar por darte las gracias por mandarme este mail.
Sí, coincido con vos: el viaje abrió cosas y cerró otras. Y también estoy tranquila con eso.
No es novedad para ninguna afirmar que ambas cambiamos. Crecimos mucho en los últimos años, y en direcciones un poco distintas. En mi caso, emigrar me transformó casi de raíz, y en sí, eso era lo que buscaba cuando tomé la decisión de hacerlo; yo quería transformar mi realidad, y lo hice. Vos imagino que igual, solo que elegiste otro camino. Y no me parece algo negativo en absoluto.
Con la angustia que trae todo cambio, me di cuenta de que muchas de las cosas que nos unieron cuando éramos chicas, en mi presente las ligo a una versión de mí que ya no existe. Y hacerme consciente de la pérdida de esa parte de mi identidad me dolió mucho, pero también trajo cosas que hoy me hacen increíblemente feliz.
Tené la certeza de que también voy a estar siempre que me necesites.
Gracias por todo.
Hoy, dos años después, Flor y yo seguimos siendo amigas. Hablamos cada tanto, nos ponemos al día, y seguimos con nuestras vidas. Pero siempre sabemos que la otra está al final de un mensaje.
Y tal vez crecer sea eso. Tal vez crecer para algunos significa ver a sus amigos una vez cada dos años y generar recuerdos que duran una vida, con la certeza de que siempre estarán cuando se quiera y pueda. Tal vez crecer tiene que ver con desarrollar la confianza de que el otro existe en nuestras vidas por más que no estemos físicamente cerca. Tal vez crecer tiene que ver con darse cuenta de que el amor es desear la felicidad del otro, donde sea que esté.
I think many of us desperately need to internalize this – a lesson I’m still learning after years and years of therapy, inner work, and skin changes…to be good enough.
We live in a world that constantly tells us we’re not enough. Not thin enough, not wealthy enough, not successful enough… The message is always the same – you need to do more, have more, be more.
But you are already enough. Right now, in this moment, you are enough.
Sometimes being good enough means doing the bare minimum. Waking up and going to work or school even when you don’t feel like it. Doing the necessary tasks and chores to get by. That’s good enough.
Not showering or getting dressed because you have a limited amount of energy and you are putting everything into survival mode… Putting off a project until you have the energy to actually give it the attention it deserves, is good enough.
For example, I put off posting on YouTube because the timing wasn’t right, I was too busy, my life has changed a lot in the last year and a half, I’ve changed a lot, my interests have changed, and I needed to take some time to deal with that. And I plan to come back, but making videos again feels like starting over.
I want to keep things real. I’m tired of the cookie-cutter social media content creator who has a formula because that’s what the algorithms want. I didn’t start doing this to get famous or become an influencer. I started this as a way to express myself and overcome my insecurities, and for a year and a half I wasn’t able to put my energy into it because I was getting used to a life I never had before, and for too long I felt guilty because I felt like I was neglecting myself and my individual dreams by focusing on a real-life partnership, but the foundation I just recently created is the foundation I needed to rebuild everything from the ashes. AND THAT IS GOOD ENOUGH.
Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that it’s okay to take a break, to prioritize one thing over the other because it wasn’t until I completely stopped feeling guilty about not doing anything with that space that I started to feel passionate about it again. It wasn’t until I completely detached myself from the project and the idea of the project that I was able to find its beauty again and sit down and write a script.
And maybe, after so much effort, you fly by on the Internet as if you never existed. You can pour your heart out by writing, painting, singing, or making a video essay – and hardly anyone will notice. But if it helped you get something off your chest and made you feel good about what you’re putting out there… Those two likes or shares? They’re good enough.
Being good enough has nothing to do with achieving monumental goals or living up to society’s or anyone else’s definition of success and worthiness. It’s about accepting yourself as you are, honoring your needs, and understanding that your inherent worth is not dependent on productivity, opinions, or accolades.
The sooner you realize that you will never check off every box on the endless lists of “shoulds” and “musts” that society imposes on you when you are born, the sooner you will live more freely. There will always be another goal to achieve, another accomplishment to unlock, another prize to win, and more to accumulate. But your value as a human being is inherent and unconditional, and therefore good enough.
Mel Bruja 