how it feels

meals, movies, Broadway plays can only be described - the who's, the when's and the what's.

if the storyteller is good, you can almost see it. you can almost hear the sounds and the melody.

but the place that even the best storyteller fails is in the feeling. "it was lovely" or "i was so happy" are dry bones compared to the living flesh of how it felt.

the emotions of grief, sympathy and love run so deep and show that words are almost foolish in their attempt to convey the truth of it.

the joy of finding a lost child, or lost love, or finding your own lost self in the midst of it all - is the sort of joy i mean. and words - alone - will not suffice.

either joy or sorrow so deep that they nearly break a heart in two must be shared face to face. there must be touching and tears - and the fearlessness to bare one's soul.

so many times we don't take the risk. the chance of deep connection - no matter how lovely - is always compared to all those past losses. the near misses that were so close, so "almost there" that they crushed us and left us gasping and spent.

such loss is not easily forgotten. but, if we re-kindle the flame from that last dying ember - our deepest desire to feel, to love, to throw it all away for one real chance to live - that is when joy appears.

i know of no other way to find it. Wanting, waiting and willing. we never know when joy will arrive. we never know when our broken heart will open that one time - and instead of being broken anew - is, instead, healed. and filled with joy.

that is where the courage lies. that is where the living begins.