Sorry I Actually Cared
April 27, 2026
Writer: Victoria Pescod
Mimi and Tato met in 1960. She was fourteen, and he was eighteen. They met at a going-away party her aunt threw before she left for boarding school. Her aunt, an unapologetic matchmaker, had a ritual. She made all the girls place their shoes into a box, and one by one, the boys would reach in and pick a pair. The shoe they pulled determined who they were meant to spend the night getting to know.
That night, Tato pulled out Mimi’s black kitten heel.
And so, they talked. All night.
He wasn’t afraid that she was leaving for two years.
She wasn’t afraid that he was going away for college.
And although they were just kids, they chose each other anyway.
For two years, they wrote letters—hers traveling from New York, his from Monterrey, Mexico. Pages filled with thoughts, questions, fragments of their days… slowly turning into something steady. Something intentional.
When she returned to Costa Rica, so did he. After two years of choosing each other from afar, they began dating in 1962 and were married by 1964. Today, they have two children, four grandchildren, one great-grandchild…and 62 years of marriage.
Mimi and Tato are my grandparents.
I like to daydream about the olden days. When distance didn’t weaken love—it deepened it. When effort wasn’t questioned. When romance didn’t make people uncomfortable. When falling in love didn’t mean losing. Because somewhere along the way, something shifted. The world became colder.
Now, it feels like whoever cares more loses. Like catching feelings is something to hide. Like we are taught to want love—but punished when we actually feel it. I wish times hadn't changed and people still urged to feel. When did being available for someone you like become unattractive? When did consistency start to feel suspicious? When did we begin confusing emotional distance with value? When did an unhealthy relationship become the safest option?
Because today, we romanticize almost everything except real love. We romanticize detachment.
We excuse inconsistency. We reach for instantaneous pleasure. We chase people who don’t choose us—and call it passion.
I don’t think we were meant to love like this. Half-present. Half-interested. Half-invested. I don’t think we were meant to question our worth because someone only reaches for us when they run out of options. Or to feel embarrassed for caring—like having a soft heart is something to hide instead of something to honor.
And yet, here we are. Learning to act like we don’t feel in a world that punishes us when we do.
There’s a quiet kind of heartbreak that doesn’t come from losing someone—but from realizing they were never really there to begin with. From being the person who shows up fully, only to be met with inconsistency and a silence that somehow says everything.
And the worst part isn’t even them…
It’s what it does to us.
It makes us question if we’re “too much” for wanting something real. If being available, kind, and open somehow makes us easier to overlook. If maybe, just maybe, we should learn to care less.
So we try. We try to match the energy. To detach. To pretend we don’t check our phones. To act like we don’t mind being an option. But deep down, we do mind.
Somewhere along the way, modern dating convinced us that vulnerability is weakness. That caring first means losing. That expressing interest makes you less desirable. That the person who feels less holds the power. So instead of leaning into connection, we resist it. We fight the urge to fall. We silence the parts of us that still believe in something beautiful.
And suddenly, love doesn’t feel like freedom anymore. It feels like a game. One where honesty is risky, loyalty is rare, and emotional unavailability is somehow attractive. But I refuse to believe this is how it’s supposed to be. I refuse to believe that love was meant to feel like guessing games and mixed signals. Because there is nothing embarrassing about having a heart that wants to feel deeply. There is nothing wrong with wanting consistency, effort, intention. There is nothing unattractive about being genuine.
The only thing that hurts…
is giving all of that to someone who doesn’t know what to do with it.
Maybe that's why I keep going back to their story. To the quiet gamble of the black kitten heel. To the letters that crossed cities, countries, and timezones without hesitation. To a love that didn’t need to pretend it didn’t care in order to survive. Because it reminds me that love wasn’t always like this. And maybe… it still isn’t
Maybe love still exists in the quiet choice to show up. In the courage to be honest about how we feel. In the people who don’t make us question where we stand. Maybe the problem isn’t that we care too much. Maybe it’s that we’ve been giving that care to people who were never ready to receive it. And maybe the answer isn’t to love less— to become colder, quieter, more detached. Maybe it’s to protect our softness. To be intentional with who we offer it to. To wait—no matter how hard it feels—for someone who doesn’t see our love as something to take advantage of, but as something to meet. Because real connections don’t sign agreements with fear. Real love isn’t found in control, it’s revealed in surrender.
So I choose to share this valuable lesson: don’t let this version of love make you forget who you are. You are not too available. You are not too caring. You are not too much. You are simply offering something real in a world that has learned to settle for less. You have always been enough. And even if it doesn’t feel like it right now— you are not alone in this. So be patient. Don’t shrink yourself. And don’t give up on love just because others don’t know how to meet you in it.
Because the truth is— some people won’t even stay long enough to know whether they could love you or not. They’ll walk away before they discover how kind you are, how thoughtful, how much you have to give. And one day, you’ll meet someone who didn’t pass by the opportunity to get to know you. While others will never know what they could have had… they will.
