Jenga

There are some things so deeply buried within that simply acknowledging their presence is shocking, especially when it's someone else doing the noticing. Do you know the game Jenga? Basically you have little wooden blocks that different players stack one upon the next, trying to build the tower higher and higher without it toppling. In the game of life, much like Jenga, one well-asked question can topple years of structures built upon a persepctive that you convinced yourself was one thing, but seen through the eyes of another becomes something else entirely.

Some of the blocks I've built upon have come tumbling down recently, and I don't know how to re-build any of that. They've fallen with a simple word, a well-placed pause, a loving question, a sincere concern. Whatever was there isn't necessary any more anyway. I don't yet quite know how to talk about my experiences. I don't know how to speak my way out of the places I've been stuck, although maybe for the first time it's not just reluctance or fear on my part. Maybe that feeling that my breath has been pulled from my lungs and my eyes fill with tears and I can hardly speak - maybe it's fear. But maybe also it's relief. Maybe also it's life flowing back into me. Maybe it's all of this and more.

But one thing I do know for certain - it's good not to be alone in this. And I'm not saying 'no' this time, to any of it.