You can't save people by holding on harder

On chipped teacups, soft endings, and shit - I just gave myself closure.

Yesterday morning, I woke up at 6:30am to get some steps in before work. There was mist outside, and I could barely see down the road. The trees all bled into each other in a muddy green blur, but I’ve realised I actually like walking in the cold or walking fast in the cold, at least. It warms you up just enough to keep going, but not so much that you get that gross, sticky cardio heat. (I mean, who even enjoys cardio anyway?)

When I got back with just over 2,000 steps in, I put the kettle on and took a quick shower. Once I was dressed and packed for the day, I made a tea in my favourite vintage teacup. It has a gold trim on the edges and soft pink and blue flowers curling up the sides, with a matching saucer underneath. It’s always felt like a little ritual, like a reward. I only use it on the slow, cold mornings when I want something gentle. It used to be in my grandma’s house, and now it lives in mine.

But yesterday morning, as I curled my hands around the cup and brought it to my lips, I saw it: a small chip, right on the edge of the golden trim. My heart dropped. It wasn’t broken, just damaged. Barely there, but still there. And suddenly, I felt like ugly crying. Not because it was ruined, exactly, but because it was proof that even the things we treat with the most care can still be altered by time. That beauty doesn’t always protect something from wear. That love doesn’t stop things from ending.

CRYYYYYINGGGGG!!!!!!

There’s something sacred in the smallness of things. Not just in the chipped edges of teacups or the comfort of morning routines, but in certain relationships too, especially the ones that don’t last long.

I remember being at a 21st last year and noticing a girl sitting quietly by herself. I’ve always hated seeing people lonely in a room full of others, mostly because I’ve been that person before. So I walked over and introduced myself. We were both sober, and maybe that’s why the conversation felt unusually honest. We ended up talking about all sorts of things like relationships, family, philosophy and at one point she mentioned how people from Nordic countries live as if the things they love are never theirs. I didn’t understand it then, not fully. But I admired her way of thinking. We laughed, said our goodbyes, and I remember hoping I’d see her again.

But I never did.

For a long time, I dismissed those moments, thinking they didn’t count unless they led to something bigger like a best friend, a partner, a forever. But a year later, I still remember her. I remember the quiet wisdom in her voice. She stayed with me in some way. I’ve realised now that connection doesn’t need to be long-term to matter. And intimacy doesn’t always arrive with a plan. Sometimes, it just appears very briefly, gently, and leaves a trace behind (as painful as that sometimes is).

I used to believe every person I met was a possible forever. That if something felt good, it had to last. When I was sixteen, I had a crush on someone for years. It was never anything serious, not even a situationship really. Just long, drawn-out glances, late-night messages, and the occasional rush of hope that maybe this time it would become something real. I held onto that feeling like it was sacred. I journaled about him, romanticised him, placed him in the backdrop of so many imagined futures.

But nothing ever happened. We were never anything more than a quiet maybe. And still, I grieved him like I’d lost a real relationship. I felt ashamed that something so nonexistent could leave me feeling so hollow.

Looking back, it wasn’t just him I was mourning. It was the idea, that this could be the person who stayed. That this could be the story I told later. I didn’t yet understand that some people enter our lives only to remind us what we long for. That their role isn’t to stay, but to show us that we’re still hoping too hard, or holding on too tightly.

There was a time when I couldn’t let go of anything without resenting it. Every short-lived friendship, every person who ghosted me, every time someone I cared about grew distant, I would treat it like a personal failure. I told myself I was too much, or not enough, or both at once. I’d replay every conversation in my head, looking for the exact moment it started to unravel. It took me a long time to realise that not everything ends because something went wrong. Some things are just meant to be brief. They burn brightly and then fizzle out. That doesn’t make them any less beautiful.

I think we’re conditioned to believe that if something didn’t last, it must have been broken. That we must have done something wrong. That we should have held on tighter, tried harder, been better. But maybe we didn’t fail, maybe the story was just meant to be short. The real danger, I’ve learned, isn’t in the brevity of these connections. It’s in turning their ending into a wound we carry forward. It’s in letting our disappointment calcify into cynicism. I don’t want to become someone who writes people off just because they didn’t stay. I don’t want to stop trusting softness just because it didn’t harden into permanence.

There’s a grace in being able to say: that was nice, even if it was brief.

To let the chipped teacup sit on the shelf, not because you’re still trying to fix it, but because it reminds you that something once held warmth.

I have a very good friend who’s an international student at my Uni. I don’t know if she’ll get a permanent visa after finishing her degree this year, or if she’ll return to her home country and we’ll see each other far less. But that doesn’t make our time together at University any less special. It doesn’t make the memories less vivid, or the laughter less real. And it doesn’t mean I love her any less just because our time might be cut short. I still have another 2 years of study left to go, and if she leaves I know for sure that I’ll miss her. But the good stuff like that warm, ridiculous, unforgettable stuff we share together, will always be there.

Even though it’s still hard for me to let go of people, even though I often want more from them than they can give, learning to embrace impermanence has helped. It’s softened the edges of goodbye. It's made the temporary feel sacred.

So yesterday, I swallowed that ugly cry that was brewing inside me and instead of trying to fix the teacup or find a replacement, I put it on display. Not out of resentment that it couldn’t make it to the end with me, but to remember my grandma, her impeccable taste in vintage things, and the fact that this teacup once held something warm. It’s okay that it didn’t last forever.

Thank you for reading x