I vividly remember the time when I had just completed second grade and was preparing to enter third. I was an 8 year old girl. It was the beginning of our three-month summer break. As I was organizing my second-grade notebooks and school materials, I found myself deeply emotional. A quiet sadness settled over me as I wondered whether I would ever see my classmates again. I wept. I began naming each of them in my mind, questioning whether life would ever bring us together once more.
Today, as I look back, I realize that I still remain connected to some of those classmates. I can recall the layout of our classrooms, the architecture of the school, and every corner of the building as if it were yesterday. Changing schools was never easy. Not the unfamiliarity of new teachers, students, and environments but letting go of the last ones. I always found it unsettling. However, I adapted quickly with the new environment —perhaps because I have always become well-known very quickly in each new place I entered. For the reasons I know.
I also remember how overwhelmed I felt when graduating from school, and again, the deep emotional attachment experienced even before leaving Kabul University. There was a similar heaviness in my heart when I returned from England to Afghanistan after I was done with my MSc, and again, every time I parted ways with a workplace that I had become familiar with. I’ve always developed a profound emotional attachment to people, places, and memories. Letting go has never come easily. I find it difficult to part with moments of happiness, and farewells have always carried a quiet sorrow for me.
I don’t have many best friends. Although I connect with people easily and enjoy meeting new individuals, I can rarely allow anyone into the innermost circle of my life. In that sense, I suppose I’m somewhat introverted. Even those I consider my closest friends are only familiar with certain aspects of my personality.
I’ve never had a role model. Throughout my life, I’ve relied only on my father’s advice. I make my own choices with intensity and purpose. I always listen to my heart which my brain totally follows without resistance. My siblings often call me stubborn, and perhaps they’re right, but it stems from my commitment to fairness and reason. Still, I always respect others’ perspectives, even when they differ from mine. When I come across traits in someone that I find unfair, I simply keep my distance and mind my own business. Again, I rarely cut ties entirely— because that person has, in someway, been a part of my life.
Carrying on, sometimes when I see how effortlessly some of my friends move on—how composed they are when leaving something or someone behind—I wonder how it comes so naturally to them. I find myself questioning whether they truly feel nothing, or whether they’ve simply learned to manage their emotions in ways I never could.
Perhaps this is how God created me—so I would learn to cherish every moment, every individual I encounter, and every place I have the privilege of calling home, even if only for a brief time. In this way, I’ve come to believe that deep attachment is not a weakness, but a quiet strength—one that honors the beauty of connection, memory, and presence.
Today, whenever I dream of those places and moments, a deep, almost unbearable ache rises in my chest. I wake up as if escaping a nightmare, tears silently trailing down my face. Yet in that pain, I find meaning—because to have lived a life that leaves behind such hauntingly beautiful memories is proof that it was never lived in vain.
Noorin Khwaja Eshaan 