Date a girl who is lost

There are so many of these articles that have gone viral about “Date a girl who…”. In the series, there is a girl who writes, a girl who reads, a girl who does not write, a girl who does not read, a girl who travels. . . Today I also read one called “Date a girl who smokes pot”. And although it made for beautiful, heart-warming essays, I could not deeply or amply connect with any of them. I read, write, travel and all of that but somehow that girl isn't me. There is something amiss. 

So I say- Date a girl who is lost.

She is the one who is sitting on a window seat looking outside. Follow her gaze and you will see. . .that there is nothing to see. Or perhaps there is. Look closely. Is that the moon following you in the bus? Do the railway tracks seem to merge into each other? Does that cloud look like an elephant rubbing his tusk on a giant pillow? Date a girl who is lost to find joy in the ordinary. She is ordinary, in her own un-ordinary ways. You won’t live a single moment of a mundane life.

Look at that girl standing at the crossroads holding a map in her hands. She is lost. Not because she doesn't know how to read the map, or which side is North, but because she is trying to figure out which road she must take.

She is the girl who would look you in the eye, pour herself into your eyes and sigh while you are explaining her tax benefits and investment schemes. She is lost in the depth of your eyes and the slant curve of wrinkle when you smile. She is the girl who rushes at the last stretch of the trek to be the first one to stand at the top of the mountain and enjoy the view. She is also the one who will click a lot of pictures, and ask you to click hers because she is lost in the beauty of her surroundings and wants to mark milestones to find her way around.

Date a girl who lets go of herself and wants to get lost in you, inside you, when you make love. She is the one looking at your fingers when you strum the guitar under the starry night sky, lest she miss the way your knuckles swim up and down above the strings. Date a girl who gets lost in colors and knows her peach from orange. You will find her painting or chopping vegetables so intently, without taking her eyes off, not having heard you call her name twice. She is also the one who listens to her current favorite song on loop. Over and over again until every nerve ending beats to the rhythm of the music. Date her if you want to know what being lost feels like, unafraid to enter that fog where the road is not visible. All you see are some blinking lights coming towards you. Sometimes there are trucks and sometimes a stranger’s torch light. Date a girl who is lost because she is trying to find her way. And in that pursuit she is not going to hide away from the roads less travelled. Be with her and you may find a road for yourself.

Her tiny eyes are always wandering, not resting on any object, not satisfied by any sight. She wants to take it all in, in curious sips and bites. She is the one who orders all the books of the writer she has discovered and loved. And with each chapter and each book she gets lost in the world created by the author. 

She is the one who has never played Hide and Seek, because deep within she never wants to be found. She wants to stay immersed, stay lost and find her way only to get lost again in something new. Date a girl who is lost not to help her find herself- she can do that on her own- but to find yourself in getting lost with her, in her.