During this past year of quarantine, I had the privilege of meeting a lovely human and falling in love. I remember meeting Sam for the first time. The sparkle in their phthalo blue eyes, a calm yet strong voice. Cooking spaghetti together, spending our weekends together, tracing hearts over each scars. Falling in love is easy.
After one of our spaghetti nights, my love came into the room and asked, simply asked, "why are you here?" I don't understand the question. I wondered to myself why such an aggressive question. I thought we were spending time together, but I guess this is over.
I responded sheepishly and lovingly like we usually do. "I'm here because I love you." After responding in a mutter I love you too, the furrow in our brows held a truth that we weren't speaking but both were aware of. The emptiness in our conversation.
Remembering. Forgetting. Learning. Unlearning. The art of noticing. In French, the literal translation of the verb constater means to take notice or see. But through my studies of French literature, it means something much more than that. The act of noticing or, rather, the art of noticing. The lives we live are busy, but never too busy to notice or see humanity.
The words we choose to share, or not share, are of grave significance. After a year of quarantine, isolation, and heartache, we are slowly dipping our toes back into reality. A shared reality. This involves thinking about the kind of reality we want to co-create.
