I woke up this morning thinking about an old friend of mine. It was the last time I saw her, but it felt like she was here again, right there in my room. She was telling me about a new literary journal and how she had just been made its editor. In that moment, she handed me something. I held her business card in my hands and listened to her talk about it as if she had created a novel. It seemed like such a small part of the bigger journey, but she truly delighted in its design in a way that I couldn’t understand yet. She was so much wiser than I was at the time. Whereas I was someone who only thought about the destination, she didn’t mind the detours, the one-way streets, the delays. She already knew what was important.
She’s been gone now for over a decade, but I feel like she came to visit me this morning to remind me of something. You see, I’m about the begin some new projects and take on some new journeys.
She knows that the old me would gladly sprint to the finish line. But I feel like she’s here again to help me remember what is truly important, to remind me to stop and smell the roses, talk to a friend, savor that cake, kiss that baby’s head. She wants me to keep dreaming, but to never forget to delight in the little things, the ordinary, the everyday. She knew better than anyone that life is unpredictable and as you get older, those little things begin to mean everything.
In her last email to me, she encouraged me to keep writing. She told me how talented I was. “One day,” she said, “I’m going to see your name in lights.”
And when that day comes, I hope that wherever she is, she’ll see it and smile. I hope that she’ll know how I’m delighting in the journey, that it’s my way of honoring her path as well as my own.