Piano Keys Amidst Chaos

I'm sitting in the library after a particularly full week.  I don't want to call it a stressful week, because it contained good elements, as well as elements that caused a great deal of anxiety.  It was a week full of ups and downs, and I couldn't help but feel as though it was a week of concentrated time - so much more was stuffed into each hour and day.

But I took time out from errands to sit in the library with my computer to write for a while.  I was typing along when I took out one of my headphones and heard that from the other room, someone was playing the piano.

And not just playing the piano - this stranger was working in harmony with their instrument to create art. There's a difference.  My sisters and I have all played various instruments since we were little, and I've seen the violin and piano become artwork in their hands.  It's incredible.

To my sheer enjoyment, the song choices ranged from Music of the Night, to Edelweiss, to The Rainbow Connection - all songs that I could sing along with if I so chose (no worries, i'ts a quiet library and I'm still sane, I did not so choose).  But they were all songs that I could listen to and be filled by - relating with them with nostalgia instead of enjoying them abstractly.

I think all great art is a collaboration of sorts.  The pianist's music in the other room is made more beautiful by the enjoyment I (and others) derive from it.  The book that I have safely tucked away in my bag is just a collection of ink and paper until I take it up and collaborate with the author, settling into their pattern of thought and the universe they've spun.

Art imitates life, and thus our lives are made richer the more we collaborate with others.  Our lives become more meaningful the more we take time to enjoy the beauty of what others are creating, the more we attempt to understand their stories.

The world isn't always a beautiful place, but it's wrong to think there is no beauty in it.  It's just that sometimes beauty is something we have to look for in order to see - in people, the art of their lives, and in the complexity of this great earth in which we get to live.

Questions I don't know how to answer

Someone asked me what marriage was.  I didn't know what to say and I almost gave the one-word answer of "persistence."

It wasn't a bad answer, but I was half-joking and it didn't really sum everything up.

Marriage is having someone in your corner.  It's coming home at the end of the day to someone who wants to know how yours was.  It's being yourself and being liked for it.  It's also being annoyed and even flat out angry now and then, but it's having enough humility to say you're sorry afterwards, or to accept their apology.  Even if they never said it aloud.  It's eating together, a lot.  It's being on someone's team and having them on your team too.  It's caring, it's being kind.

And it isn't half bad.

My heart and the words

Words are everything.

Oh, my darling, use yours carefully.  Because once said they can't be taken back.  And no matter how I try, I can't forget them.  I carry the curse of remembrance and once something is put in my little head it won't go away, no matter how I scrub.  I know you're hurting and so am I but please know that lives rise and fall on words, written and spoken.

Whenever I think of your words, my chest constricts and I'm startled by the hurt.  Every single time it startles me - the hurt.  You'd think I'd be used to it by now.

I don't want regrets, but it's too late now, there are too many words.

Life isn't a game.  No matter how many kind things are said to mend, the words spoken to break are stronger.  They cut deeper and they're easier to let fly.

Next time, perhaps our words will be a little kinder.  Perhaps we'll reach inside and use an bit of extra understanding that we couldn't find before.  It's so easy to slip, but I hope that we'll find the strength to stand.

Strangers

Stranger
Noun
An individual that one is not acquainted with.

I have developed a talent and honed it over the years. It is not a talent I am proud of or one that I tried to succeed in - this talent of turning friends into strangers.  For some reason I seem to enjoy giving my pieces to those who will some day become someone I am not acquainted with at all.

...

In the end, we're all lonely people searching for belonging, and for someone to see everything inside us, and to stay anyways.

Loneliness

Everyone needs someone to hold - some fix that dream in their mind and relinquish  all else, others cannot help but turn to the nearest soft and welcoming arms.

The Anchor, Sinking

     Years ago, when my ship drifted lonesome and without direction, I yearned for you.  I yearned for something, anything really, that could ground me and give me rest from this ceaseless tossing about and being tossed upon the seas. There were many times when I was almost thrown overboard - when I almost lost my necklace (my only possession) and yet I did not die.
     At last, I found you.  You were an anchor and when I fastened you to my ship, things changed.  At first I was skeptical, thinking that you would be of no use.  I had been drifting for too long - too long.  But when I lowered you into the waves and set you in your place, my drifting stopped.  I was finally able to make sense of this sea that I was traveling upon, and I knew where I needed to go and how to get there.
     Peace found a home in my little ship.
     Then, unbeknownst to me, a storm gathered just beyond the horizon.  I ignored the distant thunderings, judging them to be some trick of the night sky, some gull's cry contorted by the wind - nothing else.  When the storm struck, I was caught unawares.  So long had I been at peace, I forgot how to look for storms.
     The waves crashed and the thunder broke over me.  Again and again the sea tried to wreck us and I feared for my little ship and the anchor I had begun to call my friend.  At last, the inevitable happened, and my ship's hull was broken upon the rocks.  We were smashed to pieces when you, my anchor, failed and our ship drifted to dangerous waters.
     Too late to save all else, and in a frenzy not to lose you, I detached you from the ship's broken pieces and held onto your chain.  I was torn from the ship and I held onto you, and you alone.  But with no ship left to stand on, you, my Anchor, betrayed me.  By holding onto your chain, you dragged me down, down, down to the shadowy depths, battering me against the rocks as we sunk.  When we came to rest with a sandy thud on the ocean's floor, I noticed a calm that had not been present in the storm that still raged above.  Here, grasping your chain, there was no wind or rain or jagged rocks.
     Here, the storm was in my lungs.  They began burning with need - need for air and breath and life.  Danger flashed inside my mind, and I gripped your chain and swam towards the surface with all my might. But I could not move you.  You would not budge, and so I could not move while holding on to you.
     Darkness edged into my mind and I looked to you, saltwater burning my eyes. Dark shapes loomed in the murky depths.  I knew that to stay would be the end of me, yet leaving you was too full of sorrow and regret.
     In a moment, I let go and swam upwards, towards the storm, and sorrow, and regret.
     Breaking the water's surface, I found a piece of my beloved ship and I clung to it, letting the storm's merciless power drag us far away from you.  Yet, I was too tired and empty to care much whether we weathered this storm or not.  A different kind of peace that looked more like defeat came over me.

     Finally, after time had passed and no longer seemed to hold meaning, I felt the warmth of the sun again.  The storm was over and I thought I could see land on the blue and hazy horizon, but it could have been my weary eyes fooling me with hope.
     I remembered you, my anchor, and how I left you behind.  There was nothing for me now, all I had left was my one possession.  With one hand, I clutched the albatross necklace that hung about my neck, and with the other I held on to the only remaining piece of my little ship.  It was all I had left to keep me afloat.