sometimes

Sometimes… what’s there to say?  A week like any other week, except we know that isn’t true, it isn’t true that this week was really like last week or the week before, or even the week before that, we know that each week is shiny and new, occasionally tarnished, and maybe somewhere in between.  Sometimes there's still nothing to say.

We are all of us more complicated than the roles we are assigned in the stories other people tell.  This, from Tara Westover’s memoir, Educated.  This, amen.  This, oh.  This, a line I text to a friend because I want her to feel this for herself.  This, a line I write in my journal because I realize I also need to feel this for myself.  Sometimes in reminding others we remind ourselves, the reminding coming on a wave instead of a straight line, the learning settling on some curve. 

I talk to a good friend, it’s been a while and we laugh so hard at one point that I almost pee my pants, though thankfully don’t.  She is kind and wise and she inspires me, makes me feel heard.  I get off the call wondering if she felt heard too, wonder if I talked too much, wonder wonder wonder.  I text her, she texts back, I am laughing hard again.  It’s good to laugh, is good to have friends, is good to wonder and sometimes to talk more than is typical.  I am not a talker, am a listener, although in certain company I clearly talk, a lot.  Sometimes that’s how it is.  Sometimes everything comes in waves.  Sometimes a week is shiny and tarnished at the same time.  Sometimes a week feels just like the week before except that isn’t true, isn’t true at all, each week fresh and surprising and wonder-ful, if only we ride the wave through.

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.
~ Søren Kierkegaard ~

P.S. It's the first Friday of the month which means Barbara and I have a new pairing of photos + quote... hop over here.