Maybe This Is What I Was Trying to Say

 

I've spent a lot of time trying to explain myself. Why I go quiet. Why I sometimes want to be alone. Why I can be surrounded by people and still feel distant. Why I want to be invited even when I know I'll say no. Why I sometimes don't want questions. Why I can look perfectly fine while feeling completely different inside. Why I find comfort in strangers. Why I go to places alone and still imagine what it would be like to have someone beside me. Why sometimes I feel too much. And sometimes, almost nothing.

I've tried to find the right words for all of it. Maybe there aren't any.

Maybe that's why I started writing. Because a thought doesn't always need to be solved. Sometimes it just needs somewhere to exist.

A sentence. A page. A window. A place where it can sit without being judged or corrected.

Maybe that's what these pieces are. Little attempts to make sense of things that don't always make sense. Little moments I noticed. Things I couldn't say out loud. Things I wanted someone to understand. Things I didn't even know I was carrying until I wrote them down.

And maybe someone reading this will recognize themselves somewhere in these pages. Maybe they'll understand something they couldn't explain either. Maybe they won't. That's okay too.

I don't think I started writing because I wanted to be completely understood. Maybe I started because I wanted to understand myself a little better.

So perhaps this is what I was trying to say all along: I'm here. I'm still looking. Still noticing. Still wondering. Still trying to put things into words.

And maybe that's enough.

— ◇ —

A Note on the Painting
The Village Where I Came From
Pacita Abad, 1991

What I saw in it: a return to the people, places, and pieces of life that make us feel like we belong somewhere.

https://pacitaabad.com/artworks/categories/4/650-immigrant-experience-the-village-where-i-came-from-1991/