Walking in the Light

When I sit down at my desk, and tune out the noise around me, and focus on the blank lines in front of me, I forget, for that time, that someone will read this letter that I write, seeing and understanding these words that I have written about myself. I’m normally a very reserved person – superficially outgoing, but very hesitant to reveal the person inside of me. And while I’m not writing about any deep or intimate secrets in these letters, I am writing about me. Writing about things that every single person who would read this blog would know, but it feels, unexplainably, intimate, because I am not talking to someone, not looking in someone else’s eyes, not able to gauge when I’ve gone too far, when it’s all become too much, when I need to sit back and stop talking, change the subject, protect myself. I just let myself go, let my pen fill the empty pages with words about my life, my hopes, my complaints. The things that I love and the things in which I find comfort. I let the ink flow like my thoughts, and it’s strange. It’s like looking at a mirror and knowing someone else, someone invisible, is looking at your reflection, too. This is probably the most accurate analogy I can make about the experience. It’s like standing in front of a mirror, clothed, normal, perhaps in the moment before you walk out the door, when it’s just you and your reflection. You evaluate yourself. Notice things that are unusual – perhaps there’s a cowlick, or a button that is undone – things you correct and move on with, never give it a second thought. That moment is very private, and it would be very unnerving to know that someone else is seeing that, seeing that moment of our reflection.

Then, after the letter is finished, signed, sealed, addressed, stamped, I leave to mail it away. And then, standing before the mailbox, I remember – truly remember, in my heart, that someone else WILL read these words, and suddenly it’s like standing before not a simple mailbox but a precipice, surrounded by clouds, far from the ground, my heart pounding and my stomach tight. When I drop this letter in the mailbox, it will be decided. Someone will read these secrets that are not secrets, know these common, ordinary truths about me, and I have to either back away from the edge and retreat to safety amd write a new letter filled with light words, airy words, nothing words – or jump.