One of my favorite authors of my youth, was Kurt Vonnegut. I am pretty sure I have read every one of his books. He used to weave words like no other. At least, I thought so.
Here is what he said one time:
“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.” – Kurt Vonnegut
I love this quote. That we may still believe this to be a beautiful place. To be soft.
I am lucky enough, blessed enough, fortunate enough… to believe this. I haven’t been given any reason to believe otherwise.
In particular… I’ve been thinking about today is the people in my life. And yes. This is sappy. Sap. Sap. Sap. Because I have some pretty great people in my life.
Albeit. I don’t have many “friendships” from my early childhood, or even high school. Or college for that matter. Not really.
Yet. I was given the gift of wonderful parents, and some amazing siblings. Who are my dear friends.
And those who are not related… of my friends now? I’ve met the sum of them in my adult life. I am truly glad for those people. I feel proufoundly lucky to have met them.
But tonight it struck me. I wonder what we would have been like if we had been friends when we were little boogers. It cracked me up. In fact… I laughed right out loud. I don’t know why… it was just a funny thing to imagine.
It seems like trouble to me. Especially in certain cases.
But if we had grown up in the same location, instead of where we did? Again… I say definitively….. I smell big trouble. Retroactively.
I think that is why time happens the way it does. It just knows how to keep things in order, for crying out loud. It unfolds. With each tickety-tick of the tockety-tock.
And then there is this to consider.
John Steinbeck once said… “I wonder how many people I’ve looked at all my life and never seen.”
Whew. That one sort of sends me to an entirely different place. With 7 billion of us stomping around on this blue ball… I’d say we are probably glancing right past quite a few.
Yet when I think about the people who ARE in my life…. I can’t imagine that I could have done any better.
Yep. I am blessed with loved ones. And yes. I see this as a beautiful place. Softly.
So a big thanks to you. For touching my heart. And be sure when I say… I’m thinking of you today. And I am glad for you.
All of you.