Can I get a witness?

   

    See my suffering, see my confusion, my pain. Bear witness to this. Please don’t look away. It’s ugly and raw.

   The last couple months my heart has been heavy, grieving loss of what I thought was another chance at making a family with someone. I didn’t want to isolate and muster through. After starting to doubt if what I was experiencing was in my head or not, I desperately wanted—needed—to have someone bear witness to me. 

    So the last couple months I drank coffee at kitchen tables, walked and hiked, went to a local concert, skateboarded and worked out with folks— some who have come into my life just within the past year—as I simultaneously forced myself to continue working towards my Unfurl Project and keep afloat through connection. I found a common thread: times of pain and questions - betrayal and loss.  We want to pretend that if we find the secret steps we’ll find a path without pain, but it doesn’t matter who we are, what we believe, where we come from, or how we live— we will be blindsided by life. In those moments we need to feel seen. We need to know that we are not the only ones.

    Storytelling is a powerful healer, and sometimes we forget to tell stories of our pain along with stories of triumph and joy. A sorrow shared is a sorrow halved, just as a joy shared is doubled. And what is social media anyway but a platform where we cry out “bear witness to my life! Bear witness to my pain: bear witness to my joy!” For what is our life, if we live unseen— fading into the afterlife without temporal residue?

     We are desperate to be validated in this disconnected world- to feel our brief existence matters for something. That the milestones of our life didn’t go unnoticed… 

And so we post them… 

     But it is a pathetic substitute for the real shoulders we weep into, the spontaneous shrieks of delight when good news is heard, the real-time, shared moments we can recall with a “remember when…” These feel almost sacred. As when two or more are gathered it becomes a holy place. 

   It hasn’t been easy to know how to approach writing these hallowed moments of connection— to express how much it means to me when someone invites me to share life with them: an adventure, a meal, music, a profound conversation. When I started this project I wasn’t expecting how it would open me up to meeting new people, or allow me to let relationships shift. But it has. As I reach out- unfurl- support has risen up to catch me. 

      I pay more attention now to how I feel around people: who makes me feel more myself? Who makes me second-guess myself? Who can I safely express a range of emotions with, and will still be there, with grace and understanding? Who must I rehearse and edit myself for?

    Everyone needs a friend for the end of the world. For days when you don’t know how to go on, and you having nothing left but tears. And they still look at you like you are sparkling. Stunning. Magic.