“Where has the time gone?” over and over again, we rehearse like a scratched CD playing during a blistering, restless road trip. The last half hour that drags on forever.
2020 will be notorious but I don’t think it is to blame for what came and went. Could it have been salvaged if we tried hard enough? It was the year we were selfish enough to risk our lives for our own gratification. We don’t know how to care for ourselves. We’d do anything to avoid the incessant clamor of our brains. The social welfare vs personal liberty debate arises again. The digital world gnashed its teeth into all our bones. Our savior and our demise. 2020 was only what it was because we are what we are.
I can’t imagine where I’ll be today, in 2021. Or on any day in 2021. So I’ll write to the void — a figure or shape, that is the space and time of 2021 and onwards (that is, if it still exists. Although, doesn’t the future automatically exist when we view it from the past?).
I hope you are alive. I hope you are healthy and remember you are okay. I hope you care for those you love, even if it’s much harder than caring for a stranger. I hope you make peace with the life you have not yet lived. Or may not live. I hope that’s not defeat. I hope that you make peace with all you cannot see, or write, or say. All that you cannot comprehend and name. All that lives in the shadows, unseen and barely felt — but there, nonetheless. In the corner of your vision.
I hope you are proud of all the goodness that has made a home inside your heart. If it’s empty, then pride yourself for putting up with that. I hope you take a break from carrying yourself. Place yourself down for a while, go to the other room and rest. I hope you treat the world more kindly than it treated you. I hope you put your faith not in people, but in God and in yourself. I hope you don’t let the world dictate your aspirations and desires. I hope you strengthen your heart so it aches less. I hope you don’t take life too seriously and trust your instincts.
I hope your memory shines brighter on what comes again. I hope you keep your promises and hold yourself tightly and realize you are alive. You’re a breathing thing. A home to the cells inside you. I hope you live out of love. Or even out of spite. Perhaps something in between. I hope you are no longer plagued by the hyper-awareness of your presence. I hope all the grief and resentment, fuels your existence to get to a better place. I hope you know you will feel again. The good kind. There is so much more to be felt. The good kind. If you don’t see this, I hope you know that’s okay.
Happy New Year xx
