As I get up  a little earlier than usual and think about the quiet and the sunlight just beginning to break the darkness, it occurs to me that I spend most of my waking hours in noise. I pay most attention to the things that are right in front of me. But I also know that only the smallest fraction of what exists is visible to me. And I know that the noise pulls me out of thoughts about those things I can’t see at that moment.

According to the death certificate, my father had cancer for at least 2 years, yet he knew about it only in the last month of his life. There was an invasion going on in his body he had no awareness of. Since his passing, there have been machinations going on in my siblings’ lives I can’t begin to comprehend because they are so far away. I can’t just go there and see for myself. I have to half-believe bad information. I have to give in to whatever they tell me and trust.

The world covered in night. The world that’s inside you that couldn’t be closer but also couldn’t be more invisible to you. The world that touches the people you care about but only exists to you in bits of information sent over the phone. There’s so much that we can’t know. And on days when I quiet my mind from just those things in front of me, I can at least think of them and hope for the best. For a moment, some of these things stop existing in the margins.

Tags: appreciation, morning, quiet | Category Life in General