For a long time, I thought that loneliness was just a part of life, that the ache inside me was something I would learn to live with. It lessened at times and I lived in a state of contentment that wasn’t really peaceful at all. I figured that no one could be truly happy and that how I felt was as good as it gets. It didn’t matter if I was with someone, physically or otherwise, I still ached. Things took time. The past year has taught me that you can be happy a lot of the time. I used to think and hope that loneliness wasn’t cured by a person so much as it’s cured by the right person but that’s not it either, not entirely even though you can’t imagine how you filled your time and space before him. You stop being lonely very suddenly when you least expect it, when you become comfortable with yourself; like anything else, it’s a process and it’s less of a destination as much as it’s a truth you know but sometimes forget amidst the noise and the tired and the weary. You come back to that place because alone is lightyears away from lonely. Alone is just fine sometimes.