What's Next?

I ask myself this question a hundred times a day. I do not know what is to come. I do not know where I’ll be a year from now, ten years from now, where I’ll be standing when I take my final breath. It consumes me. It haunts me. It thrills me to think of the endlessness of what could be.

So often I long to be settled into a life. I watch the families that come through my school and long for that kind of stability, that kind of ability to define oneself as a parent, a spouse, a professional. I long for that kind of understanding, because as of right now, I’m just a young, dumb kid with her entire life in front of her. Every decision seems life-altering. Every choice seems to change my future. Every idea I have could be the answer to which path I am supposed to take. It’s sometimes too much, to have such fundamental power over my own existence.

And sometimes, I adore it. In the past few days I’ve gotten a new job offer, a plea to return to school, and an invitation to move to Prague. What’s next? I could go anywhere and do anything and be anyone I choose. There’s something really poignantly grand about that idea.

And still, I do not know what is to come. Perhaps it’s something I have not yet even considered, some new and exciting adventure that hadn’t crossed my mind. The possibilities are infinite.

What I do know, what I have decided for my life, is that I would rather spend my time here doing what I love than waste it preparing for things that may never come. I get stuck in this contradiction. I want to see the world, but want to save enough money to be able to settle one day. I want to own a house, but want to move from place to place, exploring new surroundings and people and ways of life. I want to love people so deeply that to be away from them for a moment means missing them, but I also want to be free enough to leave my world behind.

And to make any one choice means a loss of the other. To live for the moment means to be unprepared for the future. To live for the future means to be unappreciative of the present, and I am now struggling somewhere in between.

What’s next? Well, I’m not sure. All I can really do is be grateful for what has been and what will be. And I am. I’m grateful for all of the adventures I’ve been through and all that are to follow. I am grateful for the choices I’ve made and the choices I am continuing to make and that I have the choice at all. I am grateful that I am alive and living my life.

And I am grateful for the certainty that when I draw that final breath, whenever it may be, wherever I may be, that it will be one of gratitude, of fulfillment, of understanding. I will close my eyes and wonder, what’s next?

The Loss of Za

I know that they both read this. In truth, it’s why I hardly ever write about them as a pair. One I admire more than anyone in this world, the other I’ve never gotten close to. I use those differences as a scale for the people I encounter in my life. The world boils down to two categories; people like my mother and people like my father. People I love more than anything and people I’ll never connect with. There is no middle ground.

When my parents got divorced, I took sides. It could be argued that there were no sides to take. It was, as divorces go, a fairly amicable one. Both seemed to be in equal amounts of pain. Both had tried their hardest to make things work. Both had reached their breaking points. Both understood that it was now time.

Still, my heart was with my mother. She was and is and always has been my best friend. So instead of blaming my parents, blaming divorce, I blamed my father. I blamed him for hurting my mother. I blamed him for hurting me. I blamed him for my confusion about love and life and family and who I am. I blamed him for everything.

And while I am only just now beginning to move past that, the point is, I am beginning. Maybe forgiveness is too strong a word, but certainly I have come to accept that there are things and people in this world that I cannot change. My anger and bitterness towards someone hurts only me, changes only me, into something I cannot forgive myself for. I’m tired of being angry.

On the way home from work a few weeks ago, I began thinking of nicknames. I can’t tell you why, but that’s where my thoughts led me. I thought of the way my mother always called my father “za,” and was suddenly overwhelming saddened by the fact that no one would ever call him that again. “Za” was a part of his life that was now over. It was a part of all of our lives that was now over. She will never speak it again, and he will never hear it.

That was the first time, almost two and a half years later, that I was truly heartbroken that my parents had gotten divorced. It was the first time, almost two and a half years later, that I thought about their divorce without thinking about me, about how it effected my life. They were two people who had struggled to make a love, a life, a family work, and they were two people who finally had to admit that they couldn’t. My parents broke up, and somehow that seemed so much more difficult to say than the word divorce ever had.

I do not know what love is and it is because of my parents. That sounds like blame, but I assure you, it’s not. I don’t know if my parents knew what love was. I don’t know if they know it now. I don’t know if anyone ever really knows it until they know it, and even then, everything can change.

But it is what I think of most when I think of them as a pair. I think of the way I thought I understood something, and the way it instantly disappeared. I think of the way I may never be able to love fully because of it. I think of the way I may be destined to repeat the same mistakes.

And it breaks my heart, because what I want, more than anything, is to believe in love. I want to be able to enter it without fear, without doubt, without the knowledge that so often, things don’t work out the way you’d planned. I want to stop being angry. I want to forgive love for leaving my family. I want to forgive my parents for letting it.

I am sorry that it’s taking so long.

I Can Hopefully Move On

I’ve had a dreadful day. There. I said it. I can hopefully move on. To go into too much detail would involve a long list of inevitably boring complaints, so let’s just narrow it down to this: The person who keeps me sane at work wasn’t there, many things were yelled, curses muttered under my breath, tears shed, and to end the work day, on my way home another car hit me, knocked off my mirror, and kept driving. Happy Wednesday to you too.

I hate writing things like this, but my only other option at the moment is screaming and this somehow seemed a more productive outlet. There. I said it. I can hopefully move on.

It wasn’t until just now that I thought back to this morning. The funny thing about waking up so early is that by the end of the day, everything that happened in those first few hours is remembered in pieces, like a dream, like a memory I have of childhood – so distant, so scattered. It is just now that I remember his face.

He was carrying five large boxes piled in his arms. I stopped to hold the door for him as he made his way into WaWa. He caught it with his foot. “No, you go ahead, sweetheart,” he told me. I thanked him greatly. He told me to have a great day. Such simple kindness. It makes all the difference.

A few moments ago, one of my best friends called to ask me about my day. I vented, she listened. I cried, she told me she loved me. Such simple kindness. It makes all the difference.

It’s nice to know that in a day, a week, a year, a lifetime of sadness, there is still hope for something better. There are still glimmers of beauty and light and genuine goodness. There are still people with the best of intentions and still moments of happiness that can take your breath away. There is always the possibility of gladness.

I don’t have much else to say. I guess I just wanted to write something, anything, in the hopes of erasing the course of this day. Tomorrow will be better. It has to be. In the meantime, keep in mind that the little things really do add up. Spread kindness. It makes all the difference.

Running

I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned between two warm and silent bodies, measuring the passing moments by their heavy breaths of sleep. In and out, they sighed in rhythm. Trapped in that bed, in that room, in my own insomnia, I leapt up and walked out to stare at the moon. The world had never seemed so still.

And so I ran. Just to know that I was still capable of movement. Just to know that life was still continuing on. I ran down the rocky hill, through the street of shops with doors all locked and barred, across the path twisting and turning around the mountain. Two miles down the road I reached the cliff.

My favorite cliff, where I had sat on our first day and filled the entirety of a journal, where I had first lost track of the constraints of time, where I had dazzled in the brilliance of the vastness of the world. I stopped. I caught my breath.

Below lay a grand nothingness, a valley too deep to be lit by the light of the moon, no matter how large and illuminated it seemed. I stared up. I stared below. I have no idea how much time passed before I stood up again to leave. I know only how it felt to stand there, to be lost in both a moment and eternity, to know nothing and everything all at once.

Again last night, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for hours. I tried to ease my mind into a comfortable resting place. Minutes turned into hours and I wrestled insomnia to no avail. What was it my body and mind were trying to tell me?

We spoke for a long time, like we used to. I knew I missed it, but would never have guessed how much. Funny how that lesson is learned again and again. How you can miss something or someone, but never realize the true depths of it until they return. I was – am – so grateful for that conversation.

When we said our goodnights, I thought about that night running down the mountain. I thought about the pure calmness of everything in the world but me. I thought about the way I chased that serenity for so long, only to find it in the unlikeliest of places, only to find it in the immense nothingness of darkness.

I closed my eyes and pictured each curve I followed along the winding road, how smoothly I had moved along with it, how clear my mind had been made. I thought about our conversation, and all that had proceeded, and how smoothly I had moved along with each bend in topic.

Perhaps it seems an odd comparison. I don’t care. The point is, speaking to you feels the way it felt to run that night. The world is still, but I am moving. Something clear and calm and wonderful is being created within me. I am understanding both the nothing and the everything. I am standing at the edge of a cliff, staring out into a universe saturated with answers.

I am running, running, running. And it is you who spurs me on.

Compliments

We have this constant struggle, you and I. You give me a compliment; I don’t know how to receive it. I deny all goodness within myself. I feel undeserving. I take your kindness and turn it into something ugly, some deep form of self-doubt I had yet to discover existed in me. I allow myself to feel worse than when we began.

On the way home this afternoon, I began to wonder why. Why can I not see what you see? Why can I not take your compliment, say thank you, and move on? Why can I trust your judgment about everything in this world except for what you think of me?

But perhaps that’s the problem. Perhaps it’s not that I don’t trust you, it’s that if I were to name the people I admire most in my life, you would be in the top five, easy. What’s that old Groucho Marx quote? “I would never want to belong to any club that would have someone like me as a member.” Well, that’s essentially how I feel. I find it so difficult to respect someone who has respect for me.

Why? Well, I have yet to reach the truth in that. It seems the entirety of my life is devoted to finding that answer. And it is a struggle – a painful, self-loathing, sometimes seemingly hopeless struggle. But I am trying. I promise, I am trying.

We all seem to have that one thing that we believe is keeping us from happiness. It may change throughout the years, but we convince ourselves that there is always something in our way, one goal that needs to be reached before we can dismiss our sadness wholly. This is mine.

Maybe it appears a simple task, to just say thank you, to just say you’re right, to just take a compliment and be done with it, but you need to understand that it’s not that simple for me. For me, doing all of those things is everything. For me, being able to believe you care for me means caring for myself, and I just haven’t learned how to do that yet. For me, learning to love myself is the greatest and toughest lesson I will ever learn.

I’ve spent so much time trying to trace the course of my life, hoping that finding the source of my self-doubt would help me move past it, but maybe that’s not as important as I’ve thought it to be for so long now. Perhaps it’s time to merely accept what I need to do for myself and embrace it, do it, make the choice to love who I am. Why shouldn’t it be so simple?

I think somewhere along the line I mistook confidence for arrogance, and I haven’t been the same since. My life is not made better by my humility. I am not made better by belittling myself. I am simply made smaller, less than who I am, and less than who I could be. So much of life is having faith in oneself, and I fear I’m missing my chance to be extraordinary because I’ve convinced myself that I’m incapable of it.

And it’s funny to say such a thing, to think such a thing, because if any one of my loved ones said that to me, I would call them crazy. Because each and every one of them is extraordinary. Each and every one is capable of anything and everything they could ever want out of life. And I would tell them that, not to be kind, but to be honest.

And I know that is what you are trying to do for me. And I love you for it. And I am trying to get to the place where I can say thank you. I promise, I am trying.

The First Day

Yesterday I turned 22. This past year went by so quickly; it hardly feels as though I’ve aged at all. It seems that no matter how many people warn you that time moves faster and faster as life goes on, no matter how mentally prepared you are to accept that, you will never understand it until you understand it. And I know each year will bring the same realization, over and over, until time seems to signify nothing at all.

I generally make a few resolutions on New Years, but it’s never until my birthday that I really decide to change my life. The arbitrary markings of a new year are meaningless. When school begins in September, it is a new year. When January 1st comes around, it is a new year. When I am one year older, it is a new year, but really, every day is the first day of the rest of my life.

I was thinking about that this morning as I walked the eleven blocks to the train station, breathing in the city as it began to rise. I thought about it waiting on the platform for the train to arrive, watching the anxious mannerisms and daily routines of the people around me. How long it had been since I had simply sat and watched the world go by.

Sometimes I become so consumed with the mundane details of my day-to-day existence, that I begin to forget that my world is not THE world. There is so much more beyond me. There is so much more that I have yet to experience, and learn, and understand. There is so much more that I want out of life.

I think that we as human beings fall into a definition of our lives so quickly that before we know it, we have closed ourselves off to other possibilities. So often I stop and wonder, how did I get here? So often tracing the course of my life proves difficult. So often I have sat and considered the lives of strangers, whether this is how they had envisioned their lives, whether they are happy, whether we are all destined to settle for ordinary in a world of such extraordinary opportunity. How sad to consider the sum of dreams never fulfilled.

Because it’s so easy to get caught up, in the here, in the now, in the checklists of things to accomplish before the day is through. And yes, I suppose that we can only really take life one day at a time, but it seems a shame somehow to be so focused on what’s right in front of me. It seems a shame to forget the vastness of life, of this world, of possibility. I forget that time is still moving forward whether I acknowledge it or not. Even taking life one day at a time doesn’t stop them from adding up quickly.

And then there are mornings like this one, when each stranger seems to carry some unique light that I had yet to consider, when suddenly I appear to have all the time in the world to sit, and wonder, and be stricken with awe. I spend so much time trying to get things done, to accomplish things, that I rush through the moments of quiet contemplation that are such a necessity of happiness. I am so consumed with what needs to be done, that I neglect to revel in what has been done, in what I have accomplished, in the exquisite beauty that is this world and each life within it.

And so it was there, on that platform, on the morning after my 22nd birthday, that I decided to love my life. And so it is here that I celebrate the first day of a new year.

Grand Symphony

A young boy in orange overalls hits his spoon against the metal park bench. Bang. Bang. Bang. The rhythm has been set.

The melody chimes in, sung by what feels like every bird to ever exist, although it is most likely just a few in the tree above. They sing separately, but harmoniously, as though each had been given its place in the score, practiced for hours, days, weeks, to ensure they got it right. They sing separately, but as one. The melody continues on.

A ladybug scurries across the open pages of my journal. Too slow to be running, but too quick to be walking, I decide she must be dancing. Dance on, little wonder, I tell her in my head. She seems to understand as she reaches the edge of the page and turns back around.

A great roar of percussion from the repair being done in one of the apartments above.

A startled group of butterflies rises from the flowers. A masterpiece in and of themselves, the flowers sway for an instant, their soft and vibrant petals of reds and pinks and yellows lightly skim against one another. For an instant, all division of color blurs into one shade of perfection.

And then the world is soft. The butterflies hover in the still air, heavy with the sweetness of scent, the fullness of life breathing in and out. They float. They glide. They move with all of the subtle intent of silence. The boy has stopped his banging. The birds have quieted their melody. The world is still.

A car passes and the song begins again. Rising. Falling. Vivacissimo. Pianissimo. Back and forth, up and down, I move with the orchestra of the universe.

I think about the song of my life, how it rises and falls, how it began with a single cry and how it is still being written one verse at a time.

In silence this morning, I watched the moon. I thought of the stars, each a note on the page, reaching to the lowest and highest octaves of understanding. The moon itself, a whole note, whose roundness I climbed into for the comforting duration of four beats. One, two, three, four. Then it was time to move on.

The wind pushed through the arriving dawn. A new movement began, quietly at first, but growing louder, passionately pushing through the stillness of morning. The day began. I began with it.

And perhaps even now, in my solitude, the vibrations are resonating more deeply, more profoundly than the simple ears of humans can detect. Perhaps even now, the hum of my computer is only the shallow surface of the music being created in my presence. Perhaps even now, these words I am writing are merely a metaphor for the notes of the grand symphony that is my life.

I hit the keys of my keyboard. Bang. Bang. Bang. The rhythm has been set.

Except Everything

I do not know much. In fact, all of my knowledge could probably be packed away into one average sized box, light enough for just one average person of average strength to carry. And I would let them carry it away if needed. I would let them take from me every fact I knew for certain, every detail I knew as truth, every explanation I had ever formed. Because none of it is why I continue.

What I like in this life, in this world, in this universe is the unexplainable. I like the way everything moves in cycles. I like the way my eyes open each morning and close each night. I like the way death replaces life, which replaces death, and I like the way life replaces death, which replaces life. I like that I don’t know if we are each given one life, or many. I like that I understand life and death equally, which is barely at all. I like the idea of infinity, but I also like the idea that our time here is precious and not to be taken for granted.

I like how you can lose an entire day to a book, and have really lost nothing at all. I like that each morning is a new beginning and that every passing moment is another chance to turn it all around.

I like that everything is connected and that we are still inherently alone. I like that we are never really alone. I like that in every moment we are thinking of someone and in every moment someone is thinking of us. I like that joy in sorrow are one in the same.

I like love. I like the love between lovers, and between friends, and between family. I like the way your laugh sounds intertwined with mine, which has nothing to do with love, except everything.

I like laughter. I like how every laugh of every person is unique and the way our laughter changes each time it bursts from our lips. I like the feeling right before it erupts, and the way it makes your stomach ache, and the sense of calm it brings immediately following. I like the foolishness and severity of love, which has nothing to do with laughter, except everything.

I like not knowing, and choosing not to know, why the earth offers it’s softness up to us with cupped hands. I like the way a flock of birds could easily be one bird, how each knows exactly which way to glide along the breeze. I like the way they surge from their sitting place all at once, like a bottle of champagne being opened, like laughter. I like the way they float, like clouds, like people in love.

I like the way the trees change colors, the oceans move in and out along the shore, the sky becomes illuminated with color, all of which has scientific explanation, but all of which I choose to see as free will.

I like art, but I don’t know why. I can’t tell you why I am drawn to certain colors or shapes or images. I can’t tell you why certain songs make me sad or happy or set my soul ablaze with emotion. I can’t tell you why some lines of poetry make me cry, or why I hug certain novels when I close their final page. Someone probably could, but I’m sure I’d rather not hear it.

Because what I like most in this life, this world, this universe are the things that transcend language. Or at least, my knowledge of language. Perhaps there is a word I have yet to discover that encompasses all that I do not know, but I’m sure I’d rather not know it. What I know is that I like not knowing, which has nothing to do with who I am, except everything.

Since I've Last Written

It’s finally starting to get cold. Winter got caught up in things and was late to it’s own party. Casually it slipped in, hoping to be forgiven. Better late than never, it sighs.

Since I’ve last written, the triumphs and tribulations of life have been condensed into a concrete reminder of uncertainty. With each passing day, the extremes of joy and sorrow have presented themselves, gently nudging at the soul the knowledge that life continues to move forward. Anticipation, disappointment, birth, death. Still, it continues onward. Still, time ceases to stop.

The day after my last post, I received a promotion and raise at work. It was nice to feel appreciated, to feel valued, to feel needed in the place that I’ve devoted all my time to these past few months. It was nice to feel assured that I was doing something right for once, that this is where I belong. It was nice to feel secure in my actions.

But with a sense of security also came insecurity. We had a meeting with my coworkers to explain the situation, how I was now in charge, how I was responsible for the room. That meeting was the first time I hadn’t felt like a leader there, the first time I felt as though I had to be careful about the way I worded things so as not to upset anyone. It was the first time I felt unsure of my ideas and opinions. Suddenly, I was the enemy.

Of course, it’s working out, but now that the classroom has officially become my classroom, I take upon myself all of the success and failures that arise within those walls. I take each mistake as my own. I see each needed improvement as my responsibility. I have lost that divide between myself and my job, and now each good or bad day reflects on my soul.

That Saturday was one of my best friend’s birthdays and we went out to celebrate. We had a reunion of sorts and it was wonderful to see everyone, to catch up, to erase the moments that had passed since we had last seen one another. Still, I was exhausted, and felt that what could have been a wonderful night was overshadowed by the fact that I was the only one without a winter break, the only one who had to wake up before dawn every morning that week and would have to again the following week. I questioned my ability to have unbridled fun anymore, that all-consuming lose-yourself-in-the-moment kind of fun. The kind of fun that we should be having in our early twenties. Maybe I tried to grow up too quickly.

On Tuesday, I went out with a group of my favorite coworkers. We gossiped over dinner and drinks, talking and laughing until the early hours of the morning. We didn’t even seem to mind that by the time we got home, we had only a few hours to sleep before waking to see one another again. It was a lovely feeling. It turned work into something more, something real, something about community and friendship. It brought us closer together. It solidified our place at work. It gave us a sense of belonging.

On Thursday, January 4th, my nephew was born. Little Leo Zelnick entered this world at 12:54 pm at 6 pounds, 10 ounces with a full head of dark curly hair. “He already looks like a hippy,” my sister-in-law exclaimed, as is his destiny given the family he comes from. My excitement is inexplicable. I have two nieces and a nephew already, but living in another state, I rarely see them. My relationship with this nephew will be different. It will be real and substantial. It will be what should be. It will be love.

But as if to remind us that life is not all joyful, not indestructible, not without it’s end, the universe accompanied birth with death and took from this earth my aunt, who died yesterday from her battle with cancer. On this rainy day, the city mourns the loss of our football team last night and I mourn the loss of my father’s sister. It was kind of the world to give us this gloomy day to grieve. I am grateful for the time.

Still, time moves forward. Aunt Naomi closed her eyes to finish the last thought of her lifetime. Little Leo opened his eyes to discover the lifetime that awaits him. I linger somewhere in between, reveling in joy and sorrow, and the winter that has finally graced us with her presence.

A New Rain

She said that it was appropriate that it should rain on New Years Eve. It was cleansing, a washing away of all that had preceded, a fresh beginning to all that was to come. My enthusiastic agreement excited her. She hugged me. I don’t know who she was or whether I’ll ever see her again, but it seemed the perfect way to begin a new year.

It was still raining when I walked to my car the next morning. Drops of water clung to the branches of each naked tree like crystals. The world was soft, quiet, inviting, as though it had broken open to a center of comfort. I reveled in it for a moment before making my way down the long driveway. I laughed a little to myself, and although it was only for a brief moment, that feeling resounded in me like a tentative promise of eternal joy. I could be happy like this forever, I thought.

I left for work this morning at 6, making my way down the deserted main street, smiling at its profound emptiness. The winter lights hung across the street, filled the tiny trees along the side, twinkled in the vast darkness of the world just before the sun rises. The moon shined ahead. It was a huge moon, not quite full, but grand enough to make the universe feel closer and more connected than anyone who saw it could ever imagine. It was the way a fabulous artist would paint night. It was simple and complex. It was perfection.

On my way out of Starbucks, I passed three people making their way into the day. Each one said hello. Each one smiled that smile of understanding. Each one knew the beauty of life at these early hours before the sun. We were connected in that way, in every way, if only for an instant.

I thought of all the kindred spirits I know and all I have yet to meet. I thought of those I will never meet, those who share my thoughts and feelings and desires, but whose paths will never cross with mine. I wonder if they think of me too.

Aren’t we all, always thinking, always wondering, always imagining those versions of ourselves living different lives in different places. Sometimes my soul is heavy with the lives I am not living. Other times, not. Sometimes I am happy to be exactly me, exactly here. Those are the moments I call life.

What will this year bring? Who’s to say. My life has continued to change and evolve so rapidly, that often words cannot come quickly enough to keep track. I have yet to determine whether that will always be the case or whether it’s simply what happens in your early twenties when you have no direction, when anything is possible. Does that feeling last? Does anyone ever actually settle into a life?

On Thursday I’m meeting with three of my best friends to discuss finding a house together. What a lovely new beginning that would be, a home of our own, a family I can really see as family. Just the thought of it thrills me to no end.

But of course, even that won’t be final. We’ll live there a year, maybe longer, but then it will be time for a new home, a new adventure, a new chapter in our lives. Life continues forward. We move into the new year with hope, with joy, with the knowledge that at some point, the rain will come again and we will be reborn.

For You, Little One

You are young. Each day you learn something new – a word, a song, a story, a life lesson you will carry with you always. The world opens itself to you. It offers up the depths of understanding it has produced and consumed since the beginning of time. It shows you what it means to learn, to listen, to love. It has saved this space for you to grow. It has waited for you to enter it, to fill it, to make something of it. It has anticipated your arrival.

And now that you are here, it rejoices. We may think it’s the foolishness of youth to be so egocentric, but you alone understand that the wind really does blow with such fervor just for you. The sun really does rise and glow just for you. The earth really does blossom just so you can watch, and pick its flowers and grass, and revel in its beauty. You will discover just how true that is someday.

You will discover too, sadly, that life will continue on without you. You will come to realize that life is both shorter and longer than you could have ever anticipated. You will understand that we are all just visitors here.

But trust me, little one, that knowledge does not mean that you should ever give up on your journey. No matter how much you may suffer, or hurt, or have your heart broken, there will always be joys that outnumber the pain, that make it all worthwhile. There will always be people who let you down, but there will also always be people who pick you back up. There will be days when you fall and wonder what the point is, but the days when you rise will answer that question for you.

You will fail and you will succeed. You will laugh and you will cry. At some point, your heart will inevitably be torn open and it will ache like nothing you’ve ever experienced. I’d like to tell you that it will again be made whole, but that’s not the case. The key is to never let it close again. The key is to leave it open and let the entirety of the universe seep in. Let the grandeur of each day soak into you. Let the suffering you feel for yourself and others mix within you until it becomes compassion. Use that compassion to take action.

Do not pity yourself too much, but do not question the validity of your emotions either. You are feeling what you feel for a reason. Accept that. Accept others. Accept yourself. You are not alone here, nor will you ever be. Make this world a pleasant place to be, not just for the sake of your happiness, but also for those around you and those who will follow you.

Love children for their innocence. Love your elders for their experience. Listen carefully to both forms of advice. Becoming wise is as simple as sitting and listening and reflecting. Becoming noble is as simple as knowing when to take a stand. Becoming loved is as simple as loving.

I guarantee you that your life will not go as you thought it would. You will transform into something new each day and your future will change along with it. Your path will curve in ways you can never prepare for and you will feel blind sighted by more than one occurrence in your lifetime. Don’t let it stop you from moving forward. I promise that your newest adventure will be one that you were meant to have.

Believe in things, but remember to be open-minded. Sometimes the most concrete things in your life can shatter as easily as glass. Still, don’t fear the ending of things at the beginning. Dive into your life as though it were invincible. Cherish your strength. It will always arise when you most need it, and even you will be amazed by its magnitude. You are stronger than you know.

You are young. Your whole life is still ahead of you. You will learn these lessons over and over again. As will I, little one, as will I.

Vines

Sometimes it feels as though you’ve forgotten that your story is my story too. Your history is my history, your present is my present, our futures are one in the same. Perhaps it’s difficult to see that, as our lives twist and turn in different directions, as we travel forward down paths that cross less and less frequently. But we have grown from the same seed. We are simply two different vines on one, singular plant. We are simply two different people on one, singular earth.

My father says that what I write often seems like it’s been written in code. While I’m writing, I’m always considering the person to whom my words are directed. I have to believe that they’ll recognize it, that they’ll understand. Perhaps my code is simply a plea to find the souls that connect with it, with me. Perhaps my whole life is one long mysterious equation, and my journey is nothing more than the search for people who can help solve it.

And there is no solution, but there is something truly beautiful about the idea that an attempt is being made. We are trying to figure it all out, together. My evolution is dependent upon teamwork. I would be stagnant without you.

It’s Christmas Eve, a time that grows increasingly difficult as my family moves further and further apart. I never thought I’d be the kind of person who cringed at the prospect of holidays. I never wanted that for myself. And it’s not as though I’ve become a grinch by any means, but there is certainly a palpable loss of spirit in me. I just don’t feel the need to celebrate.

I spent last night in Atlantic City with five of my best friends. It was wonderful and lavish and excessive in every sense of the word. It was fun in the casinos and bars and lounges and restaurants, but what I loved most was the time we spent in the hotel room, laughing and yelling and regressing back to the days of slumber party madness. We joked around and jumped on each other and had pillow fights. I haven’t laughed like that in ages.

As we left the hotel, I suddenly longed so desperately to just stay forever. Not because I particularly loved where we were, but just because I loved that we were there together. And that’s what family should be. That’s what family is.

But I can’t recall the last time I felt that way about my family. Yes, I love them, but I don’t feel for them what I feel for my friends. My life doesn’t revolve around them, include them, need them in quite the same way. Maybe that’s normal, but as I watch my friends interact with their own families, I can’t help but feel that I’m missing out on something. I can’t help but feel the lack of belonging.

Because I know I should feel like I belong to the people grown from the same seed. Their blood is my blood, their family is my family, our codes should make sense to one another. But they don’t. We are separated through distance and divorce and disinterest. Our vines have been cut and we continue to grow in different directions, searching for other vines, other plants, to cling to.

Maybe that’s why I have so many friends who mean so very much to me. Maybe that’s why I am so determined to see the best in people, to keep them in my life, to make sure our ties are never cut. Maybe that’s why I would have given anything to have stayed in that hotel room until Christmas was over, laughing with the only family I know.

An Ode To Feet

I like them best this way – rough, worn out, paint chipping away at the edges. All are signs of use, productivity, and accomplishment. If I could add up all the miles they’ve journeyed throughout my lifetime, I wonder what length they would stretch. I wonder how far these feet have taken me.

I didn’t begin walking until much later than the other children. I’d sit happily, watching them all toddle around in my playgroup, or so I’m told. I’m sure my parents worried, as parents do, that I seemed to show no signs of desire to be independently mobile. But that was just me, and that same need to wait for the perfect moment to dive into something has continued to be true throughout my life.

I took my first steps in England. I just stood up and walked the length of an English garden, and that was it. I was suddenly walking. No preparation, no thought, no hesitation. I was simply ready, and so I began.

And I’ve never stopped. Sometimes all the places I’ve been and things I’ve experienced get intertwined in my mind with books I’ve read and movies I’ve seen and dreams I’ve had. Sometimes the past becomes nothing more than a series of stories I’ve heard and told.

But my feet remain the truth, the evidence, the division between fact and fiction. These feet have walked through English gardens, through Canadian forests, through the fields of India. They have hiked up the Himalayas and strolled through the streets of Paris. They have been washed in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans, blessed in the Ganges. They have squished in the mud of Tennessee as they danced to the hippie sounds of Bonnaroo.

They have felt the sweet coolness of summer grass and the frigidness of Michigan snow. They have been burned and soothed on the beaches of Jersey, Spain, France, Barbados and Goa. They have led me through the busy streets of Philadelphia, New York, LA, Delhi, Amsterdam, DC, Barcelona, London and Rome. They have stood with me silently and still on the hillsides of Ireland and Scotland.

They have taken me through churches and synagogues and temples. They have journeyed with me through the Sistine Chapel, the Metropolitan Museum, the Louvre and every other exhibit I’ve been fortunate enough to see. They have stomped along with cattle and sheep and horses. They have shopped in malls and open markets and yard sales. They have wandered through libraries and book stores for hours. They have sat patiently through movies and concerts and plays.

They have led me on and off the stage. They have exercised with me and meditated with me. They have run and jumped and skipped and danced. They have grown tough in the summers and soft in the winters. They have rebelled against shoes and worn nothing but slippers and socks for months at a time. They have splashed in newly formed puddles and felt the harshness of concrete on their soles. Their nails have been painted almost every color of the rainbow at least once and they have been placed in every kind of shoe imaginable. They have been cut and bruised and blistered and stung by bees, but they have also been tenderly washed and soaked and rubbed.

They have been cursed for their pain, but mostly, they have been loved for their purpose. One day in an English garden, I stood up and walked, and my life has never been the same since.

Grounded

My thoughts no longer flow the way they once seemed to. My life somehow seems so much more grounded in reality than it ever was before. Or at least, I’m more grounded, I think. And I wonder whether I’m evolving or regressing, maturing or settling, seeing the world for what it really is or simply learning to shut it out. I worry what this sense of adulthood means for me.

Because although I’ve always been mature for my age, my favorite moments have always been those of immaturity, those moments of blissful confidence where nothing seems to matter but the moment itself. The moments when I’ve danced like a fool, and jumped into freezing bodies of water with no clothes on, and laughed so loud I thought I may burst into a million tiny pieces. Those are the moments I look back on with fondness and satisfaction. Those are the moments I consider my legacy.

These past few months I’ve dedicated everything to teaching. I’ve sacrificed my writing and most of my social life. I’ve convinced myself that loving what I do was somehow more important than loving who I am, or perhaps, that loving what I do was all I needed to be happy. Of course, in so many ways it does, and I’m grateful to be able to love my job so effortlessly. Still, it isn’t enough.

I miss writing. I miss my friends both in and out of this blog world. I miss those pieces of my life I treasured so before I began this new chapter in my journey. I wonder how I could so easily dismiss them. I feel as though I’ve been really unfair.

The thing about being with children all day is that you forget yourself. For at least nine hours each day I’m thinking of no one, nothing, but those 18 little smiling faces. Which is both why I love it, and why I think it’s been so easy to ignore myself and the other aspects of my life. I’ve just had so much less time to sit and think.

And when I do stop to think, it’s about managing money and time, about lesson plans and paperwork, about what my students know and what they need to learn. And suddenly, days have gone by, weeks, months, and I haven’t called back a single friend or written a single blog or read a single book. And I worry what all of this will mean for me when I finish this chapter and move into the next, whenever that will be.

I worry that this will be time I’ll consider lost. Even if I don’t feel like I’m wasting my time, some small part of me weeps for that longing in my soul to write, to socialize, to become a better, healthier, smarter person. Some small part of me fears that I’ve narrowed the definition of myself to my occupation. Some small part of me mourns the loss.

But perhaps that’s just growing up. I watch movies from my youth, remembering a time when I promised myself I’d be the person I still aspire to be – that artsy, deep, selfless activist that I’d created in my head long ago. I never wanted to be what I considered an adult. I never wanted to settle for reality. I never wanted to become grounded.

So at least once a week, my coworker and I put on cheesy pop music or those goofy Wiggles and make our students dance with us like fools. We use them as our alibis for acting like two year olds, back before we ever worried about those frivolous things like money and paperwork and responsibility. And we dance and sing and jump, making sure to cherish the instant before our feet fall back on the earth, before we are once again grounded.

Beginning Again

I have no excuse as to why I stopped writing here. I think it’s best to just begin again.

A friend of mine sent me an IM earlier this week just to let me know that the letter I wrote him quite a while ago is still sitting on his desk, the envelope smudged and bent from rain and travel. Whenever he comes home, he looks at it and smiles. He thanked me. That is, after all, what those letters are for.

I wrote you over nine months ago now, but never could figure out where to send it. After a while the letter seemed outdated, inappropriate, unparalleled to where our friendship had traveled. I tried several times to rewrite it, but it was different, difficult and forced. It wasn’t at all the ten pages that had flowed from heart to mind to paper the first time around. It wasn’t at all right.

We kept all of the promises we had made to each other before I went away. We call one another more often. The time that passes between each visit is less than it ever was before. Still, part of me – most of me – would give that up in a heartbeat for a chance to have the kind of conversations we used to have. It just feels like we’ve grown so ordinary.

Because what made this, us, so extraordinary, so unique, were those words we exchanged through writing. That’s why I began loving you. That’s why I love you still. You inspired me to be the kind of writer, the kind of thinker, the kind of person I wanted to be, and I genuinely miss that side of both of us. I miss feeling inspired by you.

Perhaps that’s unfair of me. I haven’t lost any respect for you. I don’t love you any less. It’s simply that you treat me like any other friend, and selfishly, I wanted more than that. I wanted to be the one you shared your secrets with in the middle of the night, the one you called when you were having a bad day, the one you had some special connection to. I appreciate you making me feel like your equal, but I somehow preferred looking up to you. I preferred having you as more than my friend. I preferred having you as my hero.

I think about it constantly, and I wonder if you do too. It keeps me up at night sometimes while I futilely try to pretend my insomnia has derived from something else. I get out of bed at 2am to balance my checkbook or scrub the bathtub, foolishly hoping that’s been the problem. It hasn’t. It isn’t. I just miss you. That’s all.

And it’s so frustrating that I can’t get out of bed at 2am and fix that. It’s so frustrating not to have a means of expressing that want, that longing, that loss. I wish that I were brave enough to ask of you the thing I need from you most. I wish that I could somehow say “I miss your words.” Why is that so difficult for me?

But I do. I miss them. I guess the truth is, I hadn’t realized how much I had been writing for you until our words stopped and my writing followed. I guess I know here at 1am, now that my checkbook has been balanced and my apartment is sparkling clean, that the only thing left to do is think of you. And write about it. I think it’s best to just begin again.

Storage

Her memory has shifted. It’s moved away from the day to day occurrences she needs to track, away from the past decade of family affairs and important events, away from what has happened this morning, this afternoon, ten minutes ago. It’s moved back, back, back through the timeline of her life.

She can’t recall who was on the phone when she answered a few hours ago, but she can remember the trees in her backyard in 1920s India with such fervor, such precision, that it feels as though she is creating them now, here, in front of my very eyes. The feel of their trunks, the scent of their leaves, the look of their limbs baking in the Indian heat. It’s all there. Her eyes spark up a bit. I remember now, yes, now I remember.

On Friday night, I babysat for a little girl I haven’t seen in over six months. I still call her “little,” although she had grown half a foot since I had seen her last. Little girls have a way of doing that. She lives behind the school I spent thirteen years of my life in, and we spent the night giggling about the silliness of the homecoming events taking place a few feet away. We could hear the announcer, the same man who sent his booming voice over the field in my childhood, enthusiastically call each grade up to do their cheer. We listened to their cheers. I remembered ours, the lyrics, the rhythm, the dance steps. It felt like a lifetime ago.

I spent Saturday with a friend I’ve known and loved for nineteen of my twenty-one years. We went and watched the children I teach walk down the runway in a Baby Gap fashion show, then did some fashion shopping of our own, then wandered into a Starbucks for some overpriced coffee. We caught up on everything we’d neglected to tell each other over the past few months. We reconnected. We had a day that made it feel as though not a moment had been lost between us. It was a really lovely day.

That night, we met up with two more of our girlfriends for drinks and, for whatever reason, ended up discussing old field trips, and old crushes that seem silly in retrospect, and former teachers whom we’ll never tire of teasing. We chatted for hours about our pasts, each of us remembering something different, each of us combining pieces of our memories to form a history of friendship. I realized how well we all know each other, how much we have all shared, how amazing it is to have friends like that. We laughed the night away.

I was reminded of this night at lunch the next day with my grandmother as she sorted through her memories, finding stories of India and the two china dog figurine bookends she had as a child. It was here, on her eighty-seventh birthday, that she came to remember her life at age seven and eight.

Maybe, I thought, maybe our minds really do come full circle that way. Maybe we reach a certain point in life when we begin to clean out the attic of our minds, taking down each box and going through the things we’ve stored there, piece by piece. Maybe in our final moments, we are not seeing our lives flash before our eyes, but only this one last piece. This first piece we decided to store oh so many years ago, this first image of memory that has also become our last. Maybe we build it all up only to one day take it down, clear it out, share it with others so that it may be stored in their attics, in their minds, long after we have gone from this earth.

I’d like to think that I would know the scent and feel of Indian trees whether or not I had ever dared to see one for myself. I’d like to think my grandmother knows that too.

Breathing A Little Easier

Exactly one month ago today I gave up cigarettes. I’d been meaning to for a while now, but something always seemed to bring me back to them, something more than the obvious addictive nicotine. It became a habit to have one with my coffee, to light one up along specific places on my daily route to and from work, to have one poised between my fingers as I tapped away at my keyboard. It became more about the stability of having them there than about the actual desire to have them. I suppose that’s what addiction is.

And for what felt like no particular reason, one month ago today I decided they were disgusting and I needed to move on with my life. I haven’t had one since. Nor have I really been craving them the way that I thought I would. Sure, occasionally I miss them. Long drives are difficult. Traffic’s even worse. Coffee probably won’t ever taste quite the same way again. And of course, the killer, writing sans cigarette.

Somewhere along the way smoking became a key component in my writing. We were on this journey together, nicotine and I, the smoke rising from a lit cigarette echoing my train of thought. I miss the way the tip would burn so brightly in front of the computer screen. I miss the ash hovering above the keys. I miss the way each drag seemed to signify a new depth, as though every writer in the world sat and looked and thought in this exact same way. There was something poetic about it.

And yet, one day I was just finished. That part of my life needed to come to an end, and so I said goodbye and moved on, quickly, painlessly. I find it strange that among the endless over analysis of every move I make in life, there’s still this part of me that is so incredibly impulsive. I’ve always been that way. I’m leisurely and passive (which is a nice way to say lazy, I think) and yet when I know something feels right, I just get up and do it. In retrospect, all of my life’s best decisions have been made impulsively.

My mother would probably disagree, as a lot of those decisions involved making the “wrong” choice about school. I knew I wanted to go to a small college in Michigan. I didn’t. I knew I wanted to leave and come home. I did, but not exactly. I knew I wanted to take time off for India and then more time off for work. I wanted both of those things, and I’m glad and grateful for having done them, but when does following my heart become a means of avoiding my education?

The truth is, I don’t want to be in school, but I understand how important school is. I understand how fortunate I am to have the opportunity for further education, to have a mind capable of handling the work, to have the money to pay for it, to have the whole world open to me. I understand I’m letting people down by not going and probably cutting off opportunities in the future. I understand I’m being rather selfish, but maybe right now I need to be.

The thing is, I’m happy now. I wake up each morning ready to start the day, knowing in the back of my mind that if this was class I had to go to and not my job, I’d be skipping it. I’d have too much time on my hands. I’d be depressed. I know that about myself. I’m glad I’ve made this choice, and ultimately, I have to be strong enough to defend it.

Meanwhile, I’m going through each day with a smile on my face. I’m living life. I’m breathing easier. One month down. A lifetime to go.

Naptime

It takes over an hour sometimes for the final child to drift off to sleep. I make my rounds tucking them in, kissing their foreheads, rubbing their backs with gentle goodnight whispers reminding them that they’re safe. “Sleep” I tell them, “sleep.”

Within ten minutes, I miss them. I miss their voices and cries and laughter. I miss their energy and vitality. I miss them crawling all over me demanding my attention. By the time they wake up, I have fallen in love with them all over again.

All week long I look forward to Saturday morning when I can finally sleep past 6am, and by Saturday afternoon I’m already wishing to be back at circle time, singing songs, running around on the playground. It’s funny how that happens. It’s funny how I am constantly aching for where I am not, and not in a discontented manner, but in a consistent dreamlike state of what could be.

I watch my little ones and marvel at their existences. How much they have already seen, how much they already know, how much they still have yet to discover, to learn, to understand. How similar we are. I’m not at all convinced that I know more now at age 21 than they do at age 2. It’s simply a different kind of knowledge – facts and figures and responsibilities. A belief in love shattered, a faith in absolutes obscured, an innocence lost. I wonder if such a change is inevitable.

I wonder who they will become. I wonder who it was that I was supposed to be. Did my preschool teachers look at me and see this as my future? Did they sit and watch me sleep so happily, so peacefully, that they couldn’t help but be made better because of my quiet? Sometimes I think all of the secrets in the universe reveal themselves at naptime. To watch a sleeping child may be one of the most serene experiences one can know. It’s calming, it’s moving, it’s everything.

I’ve slept better in the past three weeks than I have in the past three years (excluding India). There’s something that just feels right, at peace, at ease. Yes, there are a million things to do, and the list only seems to get longer with each passing day, but I arrive home each day feeling like I used my day wisely, feeling satisfied, feeling complete. I arrive home each day knowing I made children smile and knowing that each one of them has made me smile. Spreading happiness is like no other sensation on earth. Maybe this is it for me. Maybe this is what I wanted all along.

Who knows. Life can change in an instant, a lesson I learn a thousand times a day. Still, for the present, this is right. For the present, I am here and happy and alive. For the present, I am exactly where I’m supposed to be. And I can sleep peacefully, knowing in my heart that it’s true.

17 Little Someones

Yup, it’s official. Worst updater ever. I’m so sorry, but I really appreciate all the loving and concerned emails you’ve sent. You’re all wonderful, truly. When I officially hit the 20th email this morning, I figured it was time for an update. Here goes.

He told me that he didn’t believe in fate and destiny, but that clearly I was born to have 17 children. It was quite an omen. That’s exactly how many I now have. 17 toddlers to teach and play with and love. And oh, how I love them.

For reasons that I’ll write about later (really, I promise, I will), I decided not to return to school this semester. Instead, I got a job teaching preschool and I couldn’t be happier. Each day I get to play and sing and read and laugh. Each day I get to watch my children light up with the excitement of learning something new. Each day I share in the experience of a thousand little triumphs and heartbreaks and get to hug all day long because of it. Yes, clearly I was born to do this.

It’s exhausting of course, chasing after them, solving arguments, comforting tears. Sometimes I arrive home only to realize I have no recollection of how I got here, no memory of the drive back. It can be scary, and it may be the early warning signs of my slipping sanity. Still, at the end of the day, I’m tired in that good kind of accomplished way. Today I meant something to someone. 17 little someones who count on me for everything. It’s lovely to feel so needed.

The thing about children is that you can be having an awful day, a tired-crying-fit-throwing-tantrum-taming kind of day, and yet when little Alexandra calls out “Miss Frankie!” and you walk over only to discover she wants to give you a hug, well, that day is suddenly the most beautiful day you’ve ever had.

And when at circle time, you ask Brielle to say her name and she says “Brielle. I’m an easy, breezy, beautiful cover girl,” you can’t help but laugh about it no matter what comes your way. Because children have that power, that special something that brings so much light and love and laughter into this world. I am grateful for it, for them, each day.

I have tons more to say, but for now I just wanted to update a little something. Again, I’m sorry for my absence and I promise to do better in the future. Thanks again for writing and reading, dear friends. You’re all wonderful, truly.

Poetry Thursday ~ Time

In the mail this afternoon, I received a package from my grandmother. I opened it to discover a collection of poetry she had written about her childhood in India. I smiled. A perfect poetry Thursday. Having fallen hopelessly behind in my blogging, I was unprepared for this week’s prompt of time, so what a treasure it was to discover this among her phenomenal collection. I couldn’t keep such a gift to myself. Enjoy.

The Time Of My Life : Eight Years Old
By Eve Stedman

From a hard, hot continent
where the garden had to be carved from dirt --
watered and nurtured twice a day --
I came to a cool island.

Moist earth crumbled under my hand
and, wonder of wonders
flowers grew on their own.
Everywhere I went
the hedges sparkled with stitchwort
slopes were golden with primrose
sunlight dappled a bluebell sea
and over the grass
strayed the milky way of daisies.

I was in heaven, in Eden
in a garden where no one said NO
where flowers could grow as they pleased --
and so could I.

Honesty

Sometimes just saying it out loud is enough. Just the simple act of releasing the words into the air frees them from the mind. They become more than thoughts, more than wavering theories floating through the confines of my head, vacillating back and forth between the constructs of right and wrong. They become statements. They become real.

Already I feel freed from my own confusion. Nothing is solved. Nothing is even officially decided, but I now feel ready to begin. Begin what? I’m not sure, but something. Something more than sitting around wrestling with possibility. Something more than hovering in the entrance of my life. Something new and progressive and exciting. I’m ready to step into the next chapter.

This is the reward of honesty. It’s strange how the most difficult person to be honest with is always oneself. The truth really does have its way of setting us free, but so often I find myself afraid to admit the truth in that very statement. In truth, I lie to myself constantly.

Writing seems to know that, as though it were its own entity, with eyes that pierce my very soul and questions impossible to evade. It knows all the right things to ask. It knows exactly how I feel. It knows the truth I try so desperately to avoid. It puts us in a room together and forces me to face it. It won’t allow me to stay silent. It won’t tolerate my ignorance.

There is a love I know that continues on purely with the hope, the faith, that love will be enough. Despite all wisdom and truth, it goes on. It remains unquestioning. It obscures the troubles and disappointments and sorrows of the relationship behind a haze of adoration. In theory it is a beautiful thing, but in reality it becomes something ugly, something bitter. It is the unripe fruits I love before learning they’re not ready. It is the shock of displeasure in that first bite. It is the taste of lies.

Lies that linger on the tongue far longer than anyone would hope. They hang in air and hearts, refusing to be ignored, no matter how ardently we try. Love, sadly, in all of its glory, simply isn’t powerful enough to vanquish the truth. Instead, honesty gets buried beneath the layers and begins to burrow holes in the soul. That gap is the hurtful words he told her, the next is the embarrassment she caused him, the one after that is the tears they each shed in secret. I wonder when faith in the future stops being enough.

But this is not my story. It’s theirs. My story simply leaves me with the same question. When do hope and faith stop being enough? Because it is wonderful to dream, but dreaming can only take us so far. Eventually, we have to make a move. Eventually, we have to be honest about our next step. And there is nothing more terrifying in this world than making a decision. Even the most seemingly obvious of choices holds depths of bittersweet uncertainty, and they know that, and I know that, and I think somewhere deep down we all know that.

The question then becomes, are we brave enough to admit that we know that? Are we brave enough to move forward? And I know I have to answer yes, because although stagnancy is deceivingly comfortable, I refuse to get caught in its lies. Life is waiting, and that’s the truth. And honestly, I can't afford to waste another moment.

Rejuvenation

And just like that, the sun broke through. Yesterday was just what I had asked for, hoped for, needed. It was a perfect day.

I arrived at work to find my email inbox bursting over with things to make me smile from my best friend. It’s fabulous how friends can do that, can sense what you need and know exactly how to fix it. I am constantly amazed anew by how blessed I am to have the people in my life that I have. Somehow, nothing else seems to matter but the relationships I cherish. Somehow, everything I could possibly feel sad or angry or upset about becomes insignificant. Somehow, my friends make my life worth living.

On my lunch break, I drove to this enchanting bush of white flowers I had passed that morning. I took pictures. I watched the bees fly from one blossom to the next, slowly and meticulously reveling in their soft white petals. I looked at the perfectly blue sky behind the hanging flowers and smiled at the way they so reminded me of clouds. I wanted to crawl inside them, to feel their smooth petals brush against my cheeks, to breathe their life into my own. I wanted, more than anything, to feel their beauty.

After work, I went downtown to meet up with a friend I haven’t spent quality time with in well over a year. It was so incredibly lovely. We went to dinner, gossiped over expensive girly drinks, laughed over a gorgeous meal, reconnected as though not a moment had passed between us. Her meal took much longer than mine to prepare, and so the manager came over to apologize and let us know the dinner was on them. As she walked away, we both looked at one another and said “sweet” simultaneously, before bursting into laughter that after all this time, we still spoke in rhythm with one another. It was perfect, just perfect.

I arrived home and changed quickly before heading out with my best friend. We went and wandered in the woods for a little while, talking beneath the grand night sky and the whispering trees around us. Our voices echoed in the silence, mixing with the natural hum of the earth. We were alone, and together, and one.

We picked up two more friends and headed down the street to go drink at an outside bar with even more of our friends. We drank and laughed and talked the night away. I thought about what I had written the night before, how these twenty-four hours had changed everything, how simply loving and feeling loved had made everything okay again. Welcome back, I thought to myself.

As I finally reached my bed some time later, I closed my eyes and let the perfection of the day wash over me. I thought of each person who had made me smile, of each event that had made me laugh, of each moment that had reminded me why I am so grateful for this little life of mine. I drifted off to sleep smiling, dreaming of white blossoms, knowing the feel of such beauty.

Some Days Are Like That

It was that kind of ambiguous grey morning that taunts us. The kind that seems to hold every secret but refuses to give anything away. It could be early morning right before the sun makes her grand entrance over the world, or the very beginning of evening, when the afternoon light has only just slipped away. It could be warm outside or cold, beautiful or dreary. The day could hold anything we had ever seen and nothing we could have ever imagined. It was that kind of grey, that kind of morning.

I made my way into work and found myself to be the only person in the office for the first two hours, a situation I’ve unfortunately grown accustomed to. I tended to the tasks that beckoned my immediate attention and then just sat, and thought, and grew a little sad.

I don’t understand how I ended up back here, sitting in an office by myself, longing for the world outside my window. I don’t understand how I could allow myself to settle so quickly back into a life I was only recently so desperate to escape. I don’t understand how I betrayed myself this way.

I find myself missing people all the time, but I don’t know who and I don’t know why. Maybe it’s me. I miss versions of myself that I used to be and versions of myself that I could have been. I miss people who were never even an extremely important part of my life and I miss people who were – are – an extremely important part of my life, even when they’re standing right beside me. I don’t know why I feel such loss.

But it is that feeling, and I know it. Loss. Lost. Alone.

Even to write the word is painful. Alone. I think part of me has been unwilling to write simply out of the fear of admitting that. Sometimes I feel alone in the world. Even though everything I know to be true contradicts it, even though I have the most amazing friends in the world, and a mother who would do anything for me, and siblings I can turn to when I need them. Even though I am happy and grateful and alive, part of me still feels empty sometimes. It happens. That’s life.

And I know the feeling will pass. I do. It’s just what this day happened to bring. Some days are like that. So instead of going out with my friends tonight, I decided to stay in, and am still wondering if I would have preferred to be distracted. Sometimes I wish I had less time to think.

My office has become such a cell, a barren place where I can do nothing but sit and dwell on regret and mistakes. It’s become the place that I associate with all of my sadness, and while I only have a short while longer working there (I promise myself that), I still know I have to find the courage to leave when it’s over. Leave, and not agree to come back when I get that inevitable call. I can’t afford to betray myself again.

So this is whiney and not in the least bit articulate. I had a bad day. I’m mourning the loss. I’m moving on. Tomorrow is an opportunity for something new, something better. The sun will shine and I will smile. It will be that kind of morning.

Just Like That

“Isn’t it funny” she said, “how we can just end one life and begin another, just like that?”

Yes, so funny, I thought, as we drove down the mountain towards the temple. Our program had already started to feel like a lifetime ago. We drove through the market where we had first arrived almost five weeks before. It was an odd sensation, some strange ambiguous feeling of seeing this place for what felt like the first time and somehow still knowing it by heart. The men sitting in the street, the women balancing a baby in one arm and a myriad of produce in the other, the children running and screaming down the dirt path. We floated through it, just as I had in all my dreams of home, both distant and familiar.

A lifetime ago. But then, isn’t every moment a new life unto itself? Am I not a different person now than I ever have been before or ever will be again? Do I not die and become reborn a million times a day?

I sat outside the temple. A new life began. I wrote frantically, my body so full of thought and emotion that I felt as though if my pen were to stop, my mind and heart would too. Below a sea of monks in maroon colored robes filled the courtyard, and then, just like that, seemed to vanish. Another lifetime gone. Memory plays beautiful tricks on the mind.

I moved inside. A fly wandered across the enormous marble floor. I wondered if he knew where he was, if he realized he was in a holy and spiritual place, if he was aware of this grand moment in his life. I wondered if he was better for having come here too.

He flew away as my friend’s knees hit the floor. Another lifetime gone. I watched my friend do his prostrations, up and down in prayer. I don’t know what a prayer is, but I do know what it feels like to watch someone pray. I know what it feels like to be in the presence of such peace. In silence I watched his pressed hands move from head to chin to chest to floor. I watched him rise and fall again and again, the ebbing tide of a life condensed. His faith resonated ubiquitously.

I watched it spread through the hot Indian air, so heavy with scent and sentiment, that to simply breathe became a prayer unto itself. Inhale the life that is just now beginning. Exhale the disappointments of the life now gone. Each breath it’s own preface and epilogue. Each cycle it’s own birth and death. Each moment it’s own lifetime, coming and going, rising and falling. The air lay bittersweet upon my tongue.

Something new was already beginning within me. Another lifetime gone. I looked outside to see her propped up against a pillar in her little white tunic. She looked like a rag doll I might have had in my youth, a lifetime ago, when foreign countries were under the kitchen table and couch cushions were walls for forts. She looked so wide-eyed and awake, and yet, as though her mind had already drifted from this time and place to somewhere else, somewhere new. Just like that.

The large gong sounded and the monks began to shuffle in for their midday prayer. Their chanting twisted and turned in the thickening air, mixing with every thought and hope and prayer ever sent out into it. Something wonderful was being created. A new lifetime was being formed. Another lifetime gone.

And just like that, we ended and began.

Poetry Thursday ~ Unfinished Conversations

This morning
The grass seems more alive
Than anything I have ever known.

They have so much to say,
These tiny hairs of mother earth,
Sprouting and dying by the millions.

They want to tell me everything before they go.

The first one tells me
Of the woman’s foot,
Of the heavy weight of her black shoe
Pounding on it each morning.
It shows me the scratch on its side.
It tells me it dreams of better things.

The second tells me
Of the day it rained vanilla ice cream,
And how soft and cool it glided down it,
And of the dog who came
And licked it clean.

The third tells me
Of the little ant who crawled up it
And how delightful the tickling of its tiny legs
--Oh! If only I knew such pleasure!—
And how it continues on simply with the hope
Of feeling such bliss again.

And soon the others discover that I am listening.

A chorus of stories begins.
And spreads.

I can hear from yards all over town
The discussion of when they were last cut
And how beautiful they all looked
-- Didn’t I think so? –
With their new trim, so stylish and sleek.
Admire us, they say.

I can hear the wild fields of Africa and India and Europe
Shout and sing and scream their freedom
Blowing loosely in the wind
With the hair of the hipsters
Who have spent years frolicking
Through their timeless offerings of peace.
Join us, they say.

So for a moment
I lower myself down into the grass
And I let each blade tickle me
With all of the delight of an ant’s tiny legs,
And I let each blade tell me
It’s stories of joy and sorrow,

And then I tell them mine.

And so it goes,
The old blades making their final remarks,
The new blades learning to speak,
The voices of millions exclaiming
Their hopes and fears and dreams.

The grand conversation of life continues.
Infinitely.

Flight

The rain was moving in. I watched the darkness make its way over the top of the mountain, down over the valley below, leaving only this field illuminated, then the next, like the flashlights they used to search for her. It inched ever nearer as I sat scribbling away, determined to finish the final pages before it reached me. I raced against the elements.

There had been posters along the journey, bold face type pleading for attention, big round eyes and an inviting smile. I stared at her picture. The word “missing” dropped from my mind to my heart and quickly sunk to the depths of my soul. The word “missing” was more sorrowful and lonely than I had ever known it to be. The word “missing” had lost all of its tender hope.

It was no longer a plea -- “Find me. Help me. Please.” Instead it stood as a reminder of all that was lost. -- “I’ve left. I’ve gone. Goodbye.”

Her body was found at the bottom of the waterfall.

I didn’t know her. I can’t recall ever seeing her at the guesthouse next door, dancing with the others on the porch while they banged their drums and sang their songs to the mountains. But she could have been there. She could have been.

Or she could have already left for her walk into the woods alone. She could have already been on the path to the waterfall when the clouds, swollen with rain, began to slowly emerge above the peaks. She could have already been standing there, listening to the rushes of the cascading waterfall quicken. Faster and faster they fell.

No one could determine exactly how it was she came to fall with them. Perhaps she slipped, perhaps she jumped, perhaps the wind nudged her to the edge. No one knew if she was gone before she hit the water, or if it was instant, or if she lay there crying out for hours before the darkness came. Whatever happened, she had left this world alone.

Six large birds flew above me, hovering on the fast approaching winds, escaping those places where the rain had already begun. I wondered if they had looked for her, if they had seen her final moments on this earth. Maybe this flight was a tribute to her, or maybe, she was this flight. She was the birds and their wings and the air beneath them. She was the impending rain and the shadowed fields and the earth that shook with thunder below my naked feet. She was the final pages of my journal and the words I would fill them with. She was gone and she was here. She was no longer missing.

I do not know what death is. I have no notion as to what will happen after I’m gone, but I’d like to think, I’d like to believe, that the birds will know the second my heart stops beating. I’d like to believe that they will take me in their gentle wings and, if even for an instant, allow me to hover above this grand earth and know what it feels like to soar. I’d like to believe that I’d see below, poised on a cliff, scribbling away to evade the imminent rain, a young writer who has only just begun the long journey of her life.

I will smile. I will say “yes, I was only beginning too.”

So This Is Love

It was England I believe, but perhaps Ireland. After years of travel, the certainties of memory become obscured behind the present. I can’t remember the name of the museum or the artist, not even a single painting we saw. What I do remember, what I’ll always remember, was the couple we passed as we were leaving.

I couldn’t tell at first. They had their backs to us and were looking at some grand masterpiece on the wall. She was whispering softly to him, her wrinkled arm intertwined with his, her elderly lips pressed against his ear, breathing warmly the words of art and paint and love.

In the arm not connected with hers, he held a cane. I remember thinking how fragile he seemed, propped up between a cane and a woman, as though one unassuming gust of wind would send them tumbling like a house made of cards. And still they moved together with such ease, this serene creature on its five diminutive legs, that one could hardly dare to feel anything but peaceful and stable in its presence. Together they glided through the silent room.

They turned slowly towards us, and I found myself face to face with a pair of listless eyes. It took me a moment to realize he was blind. Blind in a museum. One of the universe’s cruel jokes on man, to place him in a world filled with colors and delicate brush strokes and intricate shapes and prevent him from seeing any of it.

But the universe has its way of correcting its mistakes. For his eyes, it sent him this woman, to be his eyes, to walk through a museum with him and whisper into his ear the things he could not see, to fill his heart with sight.

I wondered if he had always been blind. I wondered if he had ever seen anything in his life. I wondered if her descriptions of the blues and pinks and oranges meant anything, or whether they were just words whose significance he had to imagine. I wondered why he agreed to come to a museum, whether it was his idea, whether he had requested it simply to spend an afternoon with her mouth pressed so tenderly to his ear. I wondered why it all made such perfect sense.

That was the first time I remember seeing love. I mean, REALLY seeing it. Standing before me was a testament of patience, sacrifice, compromise and kindness. Standing before me was a couple who didn’t need sight, or the ability to walk with ease, or the fervor of youth to make their hearts sing. Standing before me was the secret of love, and although I had never truly seen it before, I seemed to recognize it instantly. So this is love, I thought.

Love. Long after your senses have left you and your skin has withered. Long after your days of running and dancing through the fields have gone. Long after the relationships you knew would last forever have faded into old pictures and letters tucked away in your memory chest, your heart still thrives for it, on it. Because it is love that keeps us going, and love that makes us want to stay. It is love that all of us wake up for each morning in the hopes of finding, and keeping, and cherishing. It is love that spurs us on.

And the blind man knew that, and placed it in a museum, so that the rest of us could come and look. And know. And see.

Frankenstein

Once, I was in the dark
So my mother ached and pushed
And brought me into the light.

To see it, she gave me eyes.
To smell it, she gave me a nose.
To feel it, she gave me ten fingers,
And ten toes,
And a heart as big as the light itself.

To taste the air, she gave me lips and a tongue.
To hear her voice, she gave me ears.
To be my own unique self, she gave me a voice
For other ears to hear
And listen
And be stricken with awe.

Once, my heart was broken
So my mother gathered each piece
And meticulously glued them back together
And filled it with joyous blossoms.

The white petals were her tranquility
The blue were her deep pools of wisdom
The yellow were her promises of friendship
The red were her testimonies of love

The bouquet was a mother,
And a daughter,
And the heart that they both share.

Once, I was lost
So my mother searched for me
By allowing me to wander free
And aimlessly
In bookstores
And classrooms
And places around the world

And no matter how far I went,
Together,
We always found me.

Once, I felt like a nobody in this world
So my mother held me
As she had when she first introduced me to the light.

And I knew I was my mother’s daughter.
And I knew I was somebody.

Once, the world seemed empty
So my mother created me.

Heart To Heart

He sent me an email explaining his small epiphany. In the midst of brushing his teeth, it came to him, like an unexpected soft rain gracing a humid afternoon. We all have problems, he said.

Yes, including me. I must get annoyed, he thought, that everyone comes to me with their problems, that everyone seeks out my wisdom, my advice, when things take a turn for the worse. It must be a burden. It must be difficult to feel like the weight of the world hangs on my shoulders.

I’ll admit it. It is. It’s difficult to watch my loved ones cry, to listen to their pain, to feel my heart break in rhythm with their own. It’s painful to experience their experience. It’s agonizing to be incapable of protecting myself from the sadness in this world.

For these past couple of weeks, part of me has longed to take the easier path, to cut myself off from emotions, to become numb to the suffering that surrounds me. Part of me has wished that I didn’t know what I know, that I wasn’t the person everyone knows me to be. Because it would just be so much easier to be ignorant and self-absorbed. It would be so much easier not to care.

But I do care, and I can’t seem to ever stop myself from caring. I can’t seem to separate my own troubles from those of my friends. I can’t seem to remove myself from their hurt. I hurt too. I feel it all, and maybe sometimes, even more intensely than those going through it. I’ve spent these past few weeks being bombarded with feelings of anger and bitterness and utter devastation. I’ve lashed out at people who probably didn’t deserve it, and I’ve cried myself to sleep more nights than I’d care to admit. I don’t like my sorrow and it isn’t even mine.

At the same time, it is. I want my friends to come to me. I’m grateful that they come to me. I’m honored that they come to me. It's just that I’ve been wishing I knew how to protect myself. I’ve been wishing I knew how to guard my heart. I’ve been wishing I could make a distinction between their hearts and mine.

This morning I awoke to an email from another friend. It was honest and emotional and filled with the kind of reality I’m grateful my friends share with me. He’s been going through a lot this past month. What struck me most was that among the girl-trouble, and two more family divorces in the works, and struggles with missing college funds, he went on to say that he’d been up all night worrying about the war in Israel. Because their pain is his pain. Because all of human suffering is our own inherit human suffering.

And maybe that’s the way it should be. Maybe the whole idea is that we are all one, and that none of us are ever truly content because we don’t live in a blissful world. Nor would we ever really want to. Life is painful. That’s how we know we’re alive. I feel that pain. That’s how I know I love.

And as appealing as it may be to shut myself off from all of that, the truth is, I would rather cry than wear an ignorant smile. I would rather feel everything than be incapable of feeling anything. I would rather have my friends weep in my arms than weep alone. I hope that they know that. I hope that I know it too.

Mind Control

Let’s blame it on the heat. It’s just been so insanely hot recently, and I’m convinced it’s melting my brain. There was a time in my life, not so long ago, when all I could think about was blogging, and now, for whatever reason, I have to force myself to sit down and type. It’s a really awful feeling. I miss the longing I once had to update daily. I hope it returns to me soon.

A monk once asked me “Do you control your mind or does your mind control you?” That’s how I’ve been feeling about writing here lately. Have I really lost the desire or have I only convinced myself I have? I’m fairly good at convincing myself out of things I’d really love to be doing.

Like writing. I make so many excuses about the future, but of course, as so many of you kindly suggested, I want to be a writer. I just don’t know how to begin, and more than that, I don’t believe in myself enough to begin. One of my greatest fears in life is being too afraid to go after things I really want.

One of the most wonderful things my mother ever told me was “Don’t ever convince yourself that you don’t deserve the things you want.” My mother is a very wise woman. Why do we do that to ourselves? I know I’m not the only one. There are so many of us that are somehow incapable of believing in our talents, our goodness, our dreams. I wonder why that happens.

Especially because it’s usually those same people, including me, who are so quick to believe in others. I have complete and utter faith in every person that I love, in their talents, in their goodness, in their dreams. It is my life’s endless plight to love myself the way I love them. I often fear that it’s a hopeless endeavor.

I’ve gotten such lovely emails these past few days from friends commenting on my (poorly updated) blog, and each time I think “wow, what amazing friends I have,” and never, “wow, my writing means something to them.” It worries me that such a thought never crosses my mind.

It worries me that I’m 21 years old and still haven’t learned how to take a compliment. Still, self-doubt and guilt plague me. Still, I look to others to validate who I am and what I do. I am needy and ashamed of that, no matter how often I try to convince myself I shouldn’t be. That line between independence and loneliness blurs. I need people, and I need their love, and I wonder why that’s so difficult for me to admit.

Am I controlling my emotions or am I allowing my emotions to control me?

I know that there are simple answers to these questions, simple solutions to these problems, but like most things in life, I have to be willing to hear them. I have to be willing to stand up and say –- no, shout — this is my life and I am in control of it. I just still have trouble finding the courage to understand I am worthy of such a statement. I just still have trouble taking charge of my dreams. I just still have trouble believing in me. Let’s blame it on the heat.