The Morning After

It is 4 in the morning. I should be awake and get ready by 5AM, but I have given up trying to go back to bed. I demand myself to look happy, healthy, and fresh today, ignoring the fact that I only slept for a couple of hours. Forgetting that I was restlessly awakened every single hour. I think I can fake the happiness. That’d be way easier than faking the other two.

I couldn’t help but wonder. If happiness can be faked, why do people try so hard to find it anyway? Can people just be with each other and act like they are happy? Can people just make each other happy by faking their own happiness? Is there even a thing called “true happiness”?

I believe there is.

There should be. Right?

After all, human beings are created to experience joy!

Wait… are we?

Even the first thing we did when we just arrived on earth was crying hard. Our mothers were happy, though. Well, they were in a horrible pain — a crazy one, close to death — but they were genuinely happy. Our mothers were happy because they were able to give life to someone they loved the most. Giving life to someone who was once part of them. And probably, hopefully, somehow, can still be part of their life for the rest of their life.

Though she knew that it would never be the same from now on. The child didn’t attach to her body anymore. The child would eventually learn how to walk and, in no time, would be able to run.

But she was genuinely happy for being in pain — for giving life, out of love.