What does it take to connect with someone? How do our brains and hearts simultaneously reach out to the person across from us and find peace in their being? Is it comfort? Is it respect? Do we find bits and pieces of their soul that we recognize in ourselves? Or have we found bits and pieces that we wish we had in ourselves? How does the place we are in our lives paired with the place they are in their lives spark fireworks of conversation and understanding? When do we take a step back to appreciate the beautiful soul before us, shed of judgement, praise, and critique? What carries us from a corner of innocent questioning of that which is unfair to a blissful aperture of profound appreciation for that which exists in the reality we share?
We hadn’t spoken in years. We never chatted, never skyped, never emailed, and never called. We never tweeted, never aimed, never facebooked, and never youtubed. We never spoke, and we never cared.
But I always came home to him. We knew each other in and out, but never understood one another on a level that was real, honest, forgiving. I would arrive and we would embrace, years of pain and blame hidden behind the invisible cloak of kinship. We’d chat about the latest, update one another on the news, find the right words for the right moments that made the right sense in the right places. We’d skirt the truths of our childhood and make light of the ash marked remnants that scarred our hearts.
I had no idea what forgiveness was until he taught it to me. And yet, as I sat there, watching him smile a deep, profound, all encompassing smile made up of all the tears, all the heartbreak, all the struggle, balled into one, glowing behind his eyes, I understood happiness. I understood embrace. I understood maturity and I understood that place we call home.
I never planned for this. I never saw it coming. I could have gone an infinite number of days, months and years, living in my corner, treating the world as if they were expendable. But what is real, what is honest, is that I’ve lied. I’ve lied to myself to be happy, I’ve lied to my home to be safe, I’ve lied to my world to be free.
What I cannot surmise is where this leaves me, where I go, who I am, with the realization that he is my world, and my home, and my happiness. He has made me who I am today, and until today I have blamed him for who I am not. We do not make sense and we could not be understood, but we understand one another and we make sense together. I was blind to who he is, to who he will be, because I saw everything he is not. I was misguided by a tainted light of remorse and retribution, but now find myself in an unchartered territory of confusion. If I forge ahead, am I once again abandoning the confidant I have left behind, or have I been blessed with a kindred shadow that will continue to watch over me near and far?
How often do we hit the brakes on our light-speed lives to look back at the beautiful mess in our wake and discover the diamond in the rough that has quietly lit up our lives with the magnificence and splendor that was never requested, and always bequeathed.