Reminders

Unedited musings from a couple of weeks ago.

I like to create. To create space the way it wants to be. To share reminders of what we want in life. And what we don’t. Reminders to acknowledge our existence for what it is. To place meaning on nothing and nothing on meaning. Reminders to reflect, ruminate or rummage. To extract what we no longer need from our past. What served us once but never again will. To keep things that hurt because our existence requires resilience and we will get through the hurt. We will try. To hang on to the hurt until we’re ready for freedom. Until we’re ready to rummage again.

I like to remind myself that I have one life and I don’t want to be scared of it. I want to live in the fear, leaning in to see it. I remain scared, but I remind myself.

I remind myself that we are all human with the same lungs and the same heart. With the same feelings. The exact same feelings.

And that it’s okay to judge. When we judge one we judge all for there is no one without the other. The interconnectedness of individual energy creates a collective whole that we cannot be separated from. No matter how hard some try. You cannot request a pass from cause and effect.

I remind myself that my life is almost exactly as I want it to be. That I am a privileged human who philosophically creates and questions, leaving trails for my daughters to pick up and continue the search. I must remind myself daily, for without gratitude my unsatisfaction seeps deep below my skin. A slow poison that leads to impulse and loneliness. Disconnect and the pursuit of nothing. Absolutely nothing.

To create is to connect. Reach into your chest to pull out your heart and let it connect with you. With yourself.

I’m reminded when I walk down the street and see a woman holding a sign. “Help, please.” That I was not far from that woman. Walking down the street, desperate for safety, sometimes barely able to stand.

My back and shoulders hurt. My eyes are tired. But I have mouths to feed. My heart is beating. I remind myself I am alive. I am alive. I am alive.

Alicia Lee Colasurdo 2022

Originally published here.

Subscribe on Substack.

Thank you for reading!