beautiful soul.

It was a Saturday night and we were driving back from my Aunty's house after buka puasa. Luqman (the radio-hogger) was in another car so we had the radio to ourselves! Yippee! Since my car battery went dead on me a few weeks back, we lost all our favourite radio stations so my husband was unable to find LiteFM (yes, LITEFM). We finally found the station and a few minutes after, Jesse McCartney's Beautiful Soul was aired. 

You should have seen how happy we were to finally hear something decent (and familiar) on air! Jesse McCartney was playing! On LiteFM! The station that plays Classic Hits All Day... (!!!) Ok... 

Then it hit me -- we're old. I'd like to say that we're just older but no (please, Beautiful Soul is considered classic ok), we're actually old. 

And we both grew older together. 

I started dating him from about a decade ago.

We planned on getting married, almost didn't get married, and then we got married.

We had a child together. And we want more together.

We survived a 6-month long distance relationship. And we both had to relearn how to live together again, together.

We bought a house together. And we now live in it together. 

And despite all the togetherness, we still argue and fight and cry (well, I cry) to try and figure out what's going on in each other's mind; or what we both feel; or what's making either one of us happy or not.

Even after all this while. 

And then, it hit me again -- of how much our relationship has changed (or evolved, more like) and how that has changed him, changed me, and changed us. Or is it really that he changed, and I changed and we changed, and that's why our relationship too, has changed? I can't quite figure out which is which and what came first. 

All I know is that we're somewhat different than when we first started. 

And although I know that we can't be 15 or 25 forever (and I don't want to be 15 forever) and growing up and living this journey called life just has to be done before we are called to meet our Creator someday, I can't help but miss... us. Yes, US. The goofy couple who walked through the rain to get me my Theodore. The crazy couple who surprised each other by getting on a bus just to spend a couple of hours at the bus station eating KFC. The simple couple who used to make some random 45 minutes in the week the best date in months. I also miss those times when smartphones were a thing of the unknown and that when we were together, we didn't have anyone else "third-wheeling"-- just us.

Of course we had a kid, and that changed us. Of course, we moved house and that too, changed us. 

But I can't help but miss the US that I once knew. 

And that tiny glimpse of us on that Saturday night made me realise that deep down somewhere, both of us were still there, albeit (majorly) altered. We just have to work harder to fall in love with a different version of the same person, I guess?

Because beneath all our alterations, I'm pretty sure that there is still that beautiful soul we once knew (plus of course that guy and girl who still loves to sing along to Beautiful Soul and every other classic hits we grew up listening to, of course). 

Maybe we'll live and learn, maybe we'll crash and burn
maybe you'll stay, maybe you'll leave,
maybe you'll return...
maybe another fight, maybe we won't survive,
maybe we'll grow,
we'll never know,
'cause baby you and I,
we're just ordinary people,
we don't know which way to go.