Love Resized to 4” x 6”

Jade Song is a writer and artist whose debut novel Chlorine was published by William Morrow. Awarded the American Library Association Alex Award and the Writer's Center First Novel Prize, Chlorine was selected as a New York Times Editor’s Choice and will be translated into French, Chinese, Italian, and other languages. Their second novel, I Love You Don’t Die, and debut short story collection, Ox Ghost Snake Demon, are forthcoming from William Morrow in early 2026 and 2027. Song has received support and fellowships from the Vermont Studio Center and the Black List, which selected her adapted screenplay of Chlorine from over 1,700 submissions for its annual Writers Lab.

I was an unhappy child. Depressed and lonely, I grew up running away. Towards what, I did not know, only that it would be far nicer than what I had left. I craved adventure; I craved new; I craved anywhere that was not here. Because here was abuse, pressure, and ostracization, and there would be anything but.

I escaped through books, and then when I got older, had more agency, I escaped quite literally, taking whatever little savings I had accumulated from library and lifeguarding jobs to travel with a backpack, off to a country where someone online had promised me room and board in exchange for work. I was alone, young, and fearless—I was too terrified of the life I had left to feel fear for what could’ve come. From being a receptionist in Hungry to tutoring in Poland, I had fun, a lot of it, of course. The brief connections in those countries distracted me from the lack of real connections I had back home—a home I eventually did have to return to.

I would return restless. I was never happy. I kept moving. It would be better than staying. 

But somehow, over the years, I became an adult who, to her profound depressive misanthropic surprise, found a community in New York City. Artists and creative people like me, who read books, talk endlessly about anything, and love their friends and their partners and their families hard. And I love them back, so much so that they have become a home. So much so that I cannot believe that I am submerged in the feeling of missing when I leave, because for so long I thought I miss you was just something people said, not something people felt. But I feel it now: I miss you when I leave, even when I know I’ll see you when I come back.

Until then, I’ll mail you a postcard. 

I try to buy nice ones at museum shops and galleries, especially if a work of art reminds me of someone, but I love the tacky, over-saturated ones at tourist shops too. Any postcard is a good postcard, because its purpose is to be sent to someone you love, and anything enabling loving connection can only be a good thing, no matter the design. 

I know I could just pick up the phone and call. I could text, or even post to my Instagram story the exact same photo shown on the postcard. But the process of sitting down in a cafe in a new city with a pen and a pile of postcards, writing quick love notes to people far away, massaging your cramped hand, walking to the post office to buy stamps, and mailing it off to those people is far more magical, the act of love found in its effort and time and care. It doesn’t matter that the postcard might be thrown away upon arrival, or that it might arrive weeks after I have already returned home, if it even does arrive. What matters is that it was sent.

I send a postcard with no written message, just my terrible sketches of Penang’s Straits-Chinese style terracotta roofs, to my friend studying architecture in South Carolina. I send a postcard from the Musée de l'Orangerie, of Sam Szafran’s painting of a staircase descending into darkness, to my friend in New York, with a note of how it comically reminded me of our mutual depression. I send the postcards given with the check at New York City bars and restaurants to my close friend who used to live here, but then moved to Stockholm with her partner. Remember when we used to go here together, I write. How are you? See you soon.

No matter how exciting a new place is and how privileged I am to travel, the real meaning is found where I call home. What I’ve built is far sturdier than the constant turnover of visiting some new land. And I do not take this for granted—I was so unhappy as a child that I am astounded by the love around me now. So when I leave it, I send postcards. To the friend who lives ten blocks down, the friend who screams with me at weekly horror movie nights, the friend who bakes elaborate pastries and invites us over to sample them just because it’s a sunny Saturday and we are alive, how lovely it is that we are alive. I send them postcards to tell them that I wish they were here, that they would love this too, that this reminded me of them. 

How lucky to have a home to miss. I want to return to this feeling again and again and again. And before I return, I’ll send you a postcard, because I’m thinking of you. Because I miss you. Because I love you, I do.

Love Letters: Reasons to Be Alive is a yearlong essay series in which we acknowledge, celebrate, and examine the objects and experiences that keep us going, even through the hardest of times. The series is free to read, for everyone, forever.

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In the meantime, remember: Do what you can. Care for yourself and the people around you. Believe that the world can be better than it is now. Never give up.

Sarah Gailey - Editor
Josh Storey - Production Assistant | Lydia Rogue - Copyeditor
Shing Yin Khor - Project Advisor | Kate Burgener - Production Designer