Day 6: Held
Today, I’ve been thinking about friendship & luck.
maybe love isn’t what we say,
but how we hold each other
when the road narrows.
When the outcome is uncertain.
When fear starts whispering in the quiet.
Today, I felt carried.
Not out of pity, or obligation.
but out of something deeper, older,
a kind of knowing that lives in the body,
between friends who’ve walked with you long enough to sense when the weight gets too heavy.
/
To all of my Julies:
who send me lyrics like offerings,
who tuck poems into sketchbooks like folded prayers,
who instinctively show up at the station or hospital car park
before I’ve even asked.
You’ve taught me what devotion looks like
in the everyday.
/
To Colleen and Jeff:
who gave up part of their holiday
to take a train half way across the country after flying 2 oceans, just so I wouldn’t sit alone afterwards today.
What is that, if not love made visible?
/
To Fran:
whose texts balance humour & holy wisdom.
Who reminds me that even now,
even here,
there is still story, still beauty,
still something to be deeply grateful for.
Her words felt like lanterns.
I wanted to write them down & put into my coat pocket, to reach for them when the dark comes back.
/
To Allie, Jane, Em & D:
whose questions always find the soul of the thing.
You ask not how are you, but where are you now, really?
And I find myself answering in ways that surprise me. You drop comments of love or make me feel seen and heard in ways that even surprise me!
/
And tonight:
the Labour women.
Unexpected grace.
Their kindness undid something in me.
Made me realise:
people are paying attention.
Even when you feel like you’re writing into silence,
someone is holding those words with care. It might help someone else going through stuff too.
/
A biopsy is coming. I feel a bit nervous.
But today reminded me:
I am not alone in this.
And maybe that’s the only kind of certainty we ever get.
Not the outcome.
But the people.
/
Sometimes we are held by hands,
and sometimes we are held by words,
and sometimes we are simply held
by the memory of being seen.
/
Thank you, all of you, for holding me.
Today’s photo is Colleen & Jeff tapping into pure joy & climbing the best looking tree ever!