Saturday, February 14, 2004
"It's what we all want in the end
to be held, merely to be held,
to be kissed (not necessarily with the lips)
for every touching is a kind of kiss."
--Alden Nowlan
Thank you for holding me, these past two months. It was two months ago today I was in that horrible car accident, and finally, after much hard work, I'm starting to feel healing spread throughout my body. I'm able to teach, to connect with those wonderful human beings who congregate in my office in all moments of the day. I don't necessarily fall onto the heating pad and ice pack the moment I come home from school anymorel. I'm driving again--just this week--and a stick shift, no less, so my leg has enough strength to work the clutch. And I'm going on walks around the neighborhood in the late-afternoon light, the sky open, the mountains placid.
The other day, I was walking down the old boulevard in Queen Anne, the sky an endless stretch of blue. And I was listening to a song that always lifts me, soaring, with its elegiac piano, its softness. At the moment I passed the last dark tree for a stretch, the song exploded in my headphones, and I opened into the sky. The Sound was a broad swath of golden water, shimmering into the distance. And I was home.
I wrote this excerpt from a Seamus Heaney poem in the front of my new journal, a full month before the accident. And now I know it's true: "...as big soft buffetings come at the car sideways/And catch the heart off guard and blow it open."
Open, grateful, joyful love to you all. I'll happily be your Valentine any time.
All my love,
Shauna
to be held, merely to be held,
to be kissed (not necessarily with the lips)
for every touching is a kind of kiss."
--Alden Nowlan
Thank you for holding me, these past two months. It was two months ago today I was in that horrible car accident, and finally, after much hard work, I'm starting to feel healing spread throughout my body. I'm able to teach, to connect with those wonderful human beings who congregate in my office in all moments of the day. I don't necessarily fall onto the heating pad and ice pack the moment I come home from school anymorel. I'm driving again--just this week--and a stick shift, no less, so my leg has enough strength to work the clutch. And I'm going on walks around the neighborhood in the late-afternoon light, the sky open, the mountains placid.
The other day, I was walking down the old boulevard in Queen Anne, the sky an endless stretch of blue. And I was listening to a song that always lifts me, soaring, with its elegiac piano, its softness. At the moment I passed the last dark tree for a stretch, the song exploded in my headphones, and I opened into the sky. The Sound was a broad swath of golden water, shimmering into the distance. And I was home.
I wrote this excerpt from a Seamus Heaney poem in the front of my new journal, a full month before the accident. And now I know it's true: "...as big soft buffetings come at the car sideways/And catch the heart off guard and blow it open."
Open, grateful, joyful love to you all. I'll happily be your Valentine any time.
All my love,
Shauna
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