An Arch

Life gets more cherished, not because I’m going to lose it, but because I have become aware of how precious the everyday was with others that I cared about.

Last year the daughter of a friend died and the funeral reception was held at a restaurant in Bernardston, Mass, that had a large separate building for such occasions. A woman I have known most of my life was there – indeed, most of the people there I have known as long – but she has always been special to me, even though most of it was periphery when I was young, and she was a decade older. It’s funny how that gulf seems so long when you’re young and you know it’s barely anything once you’re beyond that.

She was, and is, beautiful – inside and out, and she was not just kind, but present, whenever she was around- and I regret that I didn’t spend the time with her that day that one of my contemporaries got to, but I was overwhelmed by the multitude and had to leave. I did, however, sit next to her, and got to rest my head on her shoulder for a few minutes. Time fell away and I was 12 again.

She means so much to me, and I can see the arch of our lives. She was a contemporary of the majority of the people we were involved with, and I was a child, but soon going into my teen years. She seemed so cosmopolitan to me. She had a daughter several years younger than me and I enjoyed every moment she shared time and attention toward me.

She didn’t know my inner world. For all I know she thought I was fine and getting what I needed because I had learned early on that something is better than nothing, in several aspects of my life. I wasn’t consciously aware of that back then, but I am now.

She read a story with me and her daughter, but I knew that I got more of the ironic and funny bits than her daughter did, and we got to share that. That moment is emblazoned on my heart and in my mind forever.

It’s painful that I feel the ghost of that girl wandering through my psyche, still holding onto those precious bits like those desperate people who panned for gold in California must have done so long ago. I want her to get what she needs, and I don’t know why the well is so deep.

There are other forces at work, of course, but she deserves a full well. She deserves to breathe quiet and unburdened. I just have to figure out how to give it to her.

But I honor, and am grateful for, those who stepped in fully present – whether on purpose, or by happy accident. I’m sure it is in no small part of why I am still here.