"So here’s to the cracks and the crevices. Here’s to not just finding the time to create, but making the time, wrestling the time down, wooing the time. Here’s to learning how to balance life well and not so well and everything in between and having grace for oneself in the midst of it all." - Meghan Arias
On Friday night my little sister had the words "live anyway" tattooed on her forearm. I'd scribbled out the phrase in at least eight different ways the night before, and of course, she chose the first version. Over and over these past few days, I've been returning to the photo she sent me once it was done. I've been looking at the handwriting I know so well, my own curves and pauses, and mulling over the words that mean something so different to me than they do to her, and yet regardless of their implication, I think we celebrate the same application. There's an impetus to persist, not just exist, regardless of life's climate.
This page behind the scenes, is a series of incomplete posts, little half-starts, and good intentions. I've got a stack of photos, and words on scraps of newspaper, receipts, and the backs of envelopes. I've got so much to say and so many reasons (read: excuses) why there is not the time/energy/interest to complete any of it. I've got a bag full of life that I am schlepping around with me, weighing me down to a slow crawl most days. Want a reason not to do something? I am your girl. Want to justify why now is not the time? Call me. Want to keep yourself safe and protected from the unpredictability that life almost guarantees? I will show you the way.
And then, oh, and then, I read Meghan's word from one of her latest EPs. I thought about the cracks and crevices that we can so easily ignore and discredit - about how easy it is to see them, but how hard it is to take advantage of them for anything more than hiding. I thought about wrestling time, and I've spent the last three months wondering just when it was that I lost my fight? I'm hoping now that Meghan won't mind me sharing this, but before reading these restorative words of hers before the release of her latest music (which please go get right this minute) ...before all of that, I watched her struggle. I read her posts, tweets, and status updates recording the frustration of getting lost in a life, that while so beautiful and full, is not what it could be - what it should be. I spent time with her photos of family and life and I felt kinship with the luck of having found such amazing love. I read her lines when she was not, not, not (writing, creating, playing) and I clicked off quickly - they were real and honest and they said something that I wasn't ready to hear. I can justify my own self-soothing, but when confronted by my struggles reflected in someone I respect and admire, my reasons grown thin. The fear of failure is a comforting seductress because she whispers safety with her words, and as long as I keep her close, I know just what's not ahead.
It's time, I think, to stop hiding in the cracks and start living in them. It's time, I think to stop tuning out what I do not want to feel, hear, or think. I've been hiding from myself and anyone else who might call me out - there's safety in silence for a while, but it runs out, just like everything else. You know it's funny that it took Meghan's words to remind me of my own, but they were there the whole time: It's good, I think, to love something even when it's broken, but even better at times, to love it enough to fix it.
I've got a million excuses why I cannot, but as it turns out, I've got one really great reason why I can: I want to live anyway.
