Dearest,
You’re feeling lost. And that’s okay. This letter is meant to be the start of something, a journey to understanding.
You had a moment of identity crisis last night and again this morning. And, truth be told- fairly frequently over the past seven months- with more to come throughout this lifetime, perhaps. You’ve been shyly shuffling, at times surprisingly skipping (and occasionally lazily lounging) in that dark cavernous locus of unknowing. Yet, in courageously exploring, resiliently tripping, and relentlessly wandering- you’ve repeatedly come across beautiful luminescence beyond anything you’d have attempted to counger in your mind’s eye.
These natural wonders have been humbling.
You’ve learned to trust yourself. To trust your friends. To stop feeling like a burden and to take responsibility for your desires, intentions and actions. You were incredibly foolish and silly at times getting there, yet you learned to listen.
Remember how your “word of the year” was to listen?
Remember how you naively thought learning to listen would mean “pay attention in conversation”?
Ironically- that’s the one form of listening you still managed to avoid. Yet you discovered listening like never before. Literally: you learned about musical harmony, modes, even were able to develop a fleeting pitch memory for a magical instant. You immediately noticed and rejoiced with the birds when the world was asked to rest it’s weary body and stay home for these many, many months. You listened to the long-awaited silence in the streets, the dancing of the breeze, and the constrained breathing of a ballooned dog who cleverly snuck into his food stash while you were out for an hour.
You learned to listen to the spirit (perhaps a conjured improvised ache) of Jazz - which only a few weeks prior felt like nonsense blarbs. You learned to listen to Joni’s suffering, and in miraculous consequence- listened to your own suffering: in your nauseated body, in your tormented and self-critical mind, in your restless soul.
The next strange occurance: you started hearing what people meant in what they said- you’d heard their subtext of fears, discomforts, insecurities. While still clumsy in responding, recognizing this allowed for deeper, directed connection.
You listened to your soul for what felt like the first time…old…really old…yet you already had this hunch before: you gave yourself permission to address it for the age it felt- recognizing that it might not fit the tidy confine of a birth certificate or your skin. And from there, you gave yourself permission to do the same with all other parts of your identity: sexuality, ‘career’, cultural identity, privilege…ultimately deciding that it’s okay to let other people do the naming and not worry too much about labeling yourself “I like the wine, not the label”.
This is when listening started taking on less an auditory shape. You learned to listen to your intuition- yes…even if you resisted it a thousand times over. You’ve learned to listen to your envy, and recognize it as a shared appreciation versus something to compare and compete for. As the lin-alg nerd you are, you’ve mapped out all sorts of emotions on a literal axis; learning to recognize that each seemingly “stifling” emotion…actually has a vibrant underbelly (three cheers for positive-negative space and emotional mapping! Yet...perhaps even these vectors are limiting? ;))
And after all this practice with listening- you became sharply attuned to what you couldn’t hear clearly. What areas of life felt muffled and dulled out: your job, unresolved interpersonal dynamics, childhood trauma.
You left the job with no backup plan to proudly flash at society, learned to sense and set boundaries with people you love, and sent the child to run their silly free-spirited self dizzy again - all with a big hug.
None of this was easy. All of it was petrifying. All of it has made you stronger than you could have ever conceived possible for a singular human body. You didn’t do it alone, and in many critical ways you did. You learned to ask for help, this included asking yourself.
And now we find ourselves in this position of feeling lost and dulled again. It’s terrifying: the world is your oyster, be true to yourself, and yada-yada. You know the way the game is played- what needs to happen next. You understand yourself too well now to not know what the next fear ahead of you is. The fear is frightening…I want to learn how to share. But with whom? And how? And what?
You know the why: you want to connect with others, invite them into conversation. You’ve never been one for Socials, so the word Share has taken on a foe-like quality. To Share in this new world is conjure the claustrophobic feeling of standing on a soapbox with a megaphone in a sea of other people…yet- they’re all on soapboxes and all have megaphones. Who is then standing tallest? And what is with all this noise?
I’m scared. Scared of just broadcasting.
You know how to. You act upon a myriad of silly, clever fun ways to connect all the time. You always have; Nonna’s voice cheekily resonating in your mind’s ear: una ne pensa, mille ne fa.
Yet it’s still all very private- just with one person, or a few curated circle of friends, or family. You know the people you’re connecting with- it feels controlled. You trust yourself enough in this space- recognize this space- that the people that come and engage won’t misconstrue you.
~~
So- after all this learning about the self, it really sounds like I’m still learning to trust myself. My existence is just a Sliver of a Blip within random timeless eternity. Perhaps all I should know is that my story needs to make sense to me.
So why conform and play to the rules of a game you know will only change tune with the next coming societal wisdom?
Or perhaps that I needn’t fret over ‘sense’ at all; it will come, and go. Whyte crossed the sea, Fenyman not-so-sneakily sauntered Los Alamos, D’Avenia flourished in Fragility…and so on…you’re now crunchin’ through your untrodden snow- much like you’ve always done…you weird, nerdy, introverted misfit :)
Keep reaching for those stars. They trust their place and their role in life. It is now you entrusted to desire.
Much love,
peque
(inter sidera, tempus ignotus)