My best writing might land in someone’s inbox. I send “epic” emails, I’m told, and texts as long as letters.
Befriending a writer in love with words – and all the ways they connect us – means you’ll get some heartfelt messages.
Finding one 2015 note to an old, long-distance friend last week, pasted into a journal, uplifted me. The backstory: We’d both been through recent breakups, and I wanted to encourage him. May you also be encouraged.
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It’s not a new lesson, to be with someone who values my best qualities and Candace-nature instead of criticizing or tolerating them.
I accept I may need to repeat and relearn it.
But the biggest lesson is this: I can be more broken than I can or will describe to you, my health can join in the suffering for awhile, and I can begin again. And again. And again.
We forget beginnings in the darkness. But that’s ok. It clears the way for what’s next, whether we name it or not. So if we were hanging out, I’d hug you over that breakup and those broken, maybe even empty feelings you describe.
We all wish we could hand out a fast-forward button to friends going through pain which is always a solitary journey at its core.
But I would quietly and silently see you as one of the strongest people I know, and I would wish for you all the amazing things you deserve to fill in all the broken places.
And someday, in a cycle of learning and beginning again myself – i.e. life – I’ll try to remember that after a clearing out and burning away, something beautiful grows.
And something wonderful, a relationship, job, etc., is headed your way. You don’t have to be ready to wish for it or look for it yet. You’ll be ready when you’re ready. And all this “yuck” will help you define just how good it is.
You’re suffering now, if I’m hearing you properly. I wish I could fix it. The best I can do is recognize you’re also gaining traction and context for the next good-great thing in your life.
Cocoons are hot, dark places where we grow all the wings and things we can’t use yet. That’s how I feel. Your experience may be different. I don’t want to suggest anything other than we are each the only experts at living our own unique lives. And to raise a tea glass to better times and new beginnings for both of us.