Saturday, January 24
Funny
"So far away from the place where I started from-
just another re-arranger of the proverbial bookshelf."
It's funny, I guess, how much we impact every single person around us. I'll say something in a moment of sadness or stress or anger or anxiety or selfishness and, afterwards, no matter how many times I think and say the words, "I'm sorry..." "Strictly speaking that's not true..." "I was just being ridiculous..." the words remain said.
Why is that, do you think? Why do mistakes have to linger, hard words in the hearts of those we love? Why can't, if I say sorry, the moment just disappear. When I want it so badly to. When I'm so, so sorry.
I've been used to trying to separate the person from the action. "Yes, he did this, but maybe it was for this reason and NOT for this one. How can you be sure that that's why he said it?" In some ways, it's good for me to remember not to judge people, so I remember that people are basically good, even if their actions don't show it. But, then again, I'm not supposed to judge even that. ...so shall ye be judged.
But that method, of separating person from action, also has a down side. In my separating, I forget that sometimes a gift is just a gift. Sometimes it's important not to try to find hidden reasons that aren't there, that destroy the meaning of the gift.
I'm going to try to stop from ever saying the things that hurt people, even if I don't mean them to, even if I hold the thought inside me somewhere.
Merry Jamuary.
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1 comment:
Dear loverhead, your comments re gifts here made me hope that you were not reading into my gift something negative (oh, I hope not) and two, that I had done a better job of giving it to you. Know these things:
1. Someone once gave me a book--a copy of Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet--right off his bookshelf, and even though I never liked it much (it's too much, or too little, or something), I was so delighted by the personal-ness of it, the "here, I've read this and loved this and you should have it" that I always remembered it. And kept the book for that reason alone. (I mean, unless I got rid of it in my most recent purge.)
2. Dad suggested I read some writing style book when I was in high school (just about your age, as they say)--Strunk and White, I think--and even though it was kind of stiff-collared, I felt so honored, so adult, so real about it, about taking my own writing seriously in my own way, and I was kind of struck then (more than I knew at the time) that (1) other people cared about the same things I did (choosing often versus oftentimes, for one), and (2) other people had good advice for me and my writing (choosing often versus oftentimes, for one). I loved this moment.
And so, for these two reasons, I thought I would give you my favorite style book. Right off my bookshelf (see reason #1) and for your own writing (reason #2), because you are a great writer, a true writer, and you own your writing. And you like the things that I like. (I've never seen you use oftentimes, for one.) And I love you for it. I feel like we're sisters in writing as well as sisters in blood. (And I have a feeling you'll be a much better writer someday than I'll ever be, so I might as well be a part of your trajectory towards that, so I can feel on the inside rather than left behind.)
I love, love you very much. Let's both articulate true things and love as well as we possibly can. Jesus was an exemplary advocate; I want to be one, too. Join me?
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