Don’t let yourself only love one thing. Because if you only love one thing and that thing goes away? Well…then you’re left with nothing. And that sucks. - Bunny Folger, Only Murders in The Building

When I heard this line while watching Only Murders in The Building, I made Michael rewind the scene so that I could accurately jot the line down in a notebook. The words seemed important to me for some reason. While the character speaking the line was referring to her life’s work as the board director for her apartment building, I feel that this line goes deeper than just one’s life work. It can be easy to turn all your love and devotion onto one idea.

I wonder how my life would be now if I had only allowed myself one thing, one interest, one person. I probably wouldn’t notice how I had limited myself until the one thing was gone. I drank the kool-aid of interdisciplinary curriculum during my undergraduate years and made it a point to surround myself with more than science, building my own circus family in the process. Except, in a way I did love one thing. A person. It is no secret that I still love that person even though he’s gone and has been for awhile now. I think the thing Bunny failed to realize on her last day of living was that you can love just one thing. You can devote your life to it, fully immerse yourself into it and soaking in it so that your fingers are perpetually wrinkled. You can do all of that just as long as you recognize that everything is temporary. If you can love that temporary thing that much, then you can love something else when it is gone. All that is required is that you keep your open to the idea of something else, something more.

If anything, loving one thing teaches you that you have the ability to love.