The Fire in the Hearth of Life
08.01.17
I feel like I’ve lost a few best friends in the span of a few short years and it sucks.
One of them disappeared from my life, one of them made me say “enough is enough” and one of them kind of just drifted away.
Thinking about this makes me sad, because I can still taste the honey-golden sweetness of every reckless summer night – the feel of water against naked skin, a day when every chance encounter led to almost perfect bliss, hysterical, senseless laughter over something that was nothing at all, every teary-eyed secret, every quiet heartbreak, every whispered name – all those little adventures that punctuated our lives and wrapped us ever-closer together.
I spent my whole life believing things like that were invincible, but people can surprise you, and things can quickly change.
Maybe that’s what growing up is – changing and changing and drifting further and further apart until you can barely recognize each other at all. And I’ve thought about fighting it and clinging on to things and going the distance to keep things as they were, but I’m too tired for the desperation, and I’m scared I’m the only one who wants things to stay the same.
People grow up and move on, and maybe I just have to accept that.
But the fire-hot pulse I felt sitting next to you – the collective you – just being able to share all those gleaming shards of life – all the rainy day laziness or every strobe-lit flashing night – every simple act of intimacy and love, sometimes passed between us without a single spoken word. Sometimes I thought I could burst with all the love I felt, and sometimes I was so content my heart would play a quiet, smiling hum.
I guess I’m okay if one day I’m just a footnote in your lives, but you’ll all be stories I tell myself on sunny days, and memories that let me grasp every colour and every hue, and maybe one day I’ll write you into being and everything I never got to say will come crashing down with the weight of all the silent years – or maybe I’m just getting ahead of myself.
Still, I hope one day we can reclaim the closeness that once dominated our lives – or at least dominated mine. Because I miss feeling connected – feeling truly seen and understood, because really that’s all any of us want, isn’t it? To be known to someone? To see your heart reflected and accepted in someone else’s eyes? To feel like the world might be just a small and harmless thing, not so scary when shared in some tender, secret way? Maybe one day we can nurture that tenderness and retie the heartstrings that let me know the world isn’t such a lonely place after all – that kindred spirits, though rare, are the fire in the hearth of life, and the quiet in a busy world, and the familiar comfort of a home.
What I’m trying to say is I miss you guys, but I’m okay, and I hope that love is as invincible as I spent my whole life believing it to be.
