What to say...

Like most writers, my preferred condition is solitary. If I owned a cave, I would live in it, lowering a basket now and then for urgent supplies. However, if a reader happened by and clambered up the cliffside to see me, I'd surely build a fire, haul out the graham crackers, Hershey bars, and marshmallows. My reader and I would have a high old time over a sloppy batch of blackened s'mores, chattering about everything under the sun. I will always make time for my readers. Count on it.

There was a time when I was far more outgoing than I am today. I did a fair amount of public speaking then too, and every so often I'd get a phone call. Tell me what to say, the voice on the other end would beg, Just give me something to say. I'm afraid my callers hung up, bitterly disappointed, when I pointed out that day-to-day relationships rarely flourish on snappy come-backs. Besides, I didn't have any. I've never been particularly adept at social encounters, and probably my career choice is connected to that. Writing gives me time to polish my dialog, something life never does.

Yesterday I got a longish email from a woman I've known, in a sense, for quite a while. We have a friend in common, and he's kept us up to date over the years. The times I've bumped into her, she's struck me as open, funny, empathetic, and creative. She wrote to say she was reading through my blog, and mentioned a couple of posts she liked. Next she wrote about a conversation she'd had, one with a sibling. It was a long conversation, with some shared, painful confidences, and later she cried. Then she vacuumed and had some ice cream. She closed her email saying that afterwards she'd thought to herself that she wanted to talk to me. She thought: Ashley would know what to say. But her in-the-moment response was better than anything I could think up.

I've had phone calls like that, the ones that dredge up disconcerting stuff from the briny deep, then leave you surprised and exhausted. And while I've done my share of sobbing, I never had the good sense to vacuum or eat a bowl of ice cream. Both would have done me more good than my usual reaction, which is to walk in circles, smoke a pack of cigarettes, and brood. Besides, after a wrenching conversation, there really isn't anything to say. To the one who has been wrenched, you can say there, there, and make mooing sounds, then throw in a shoulder pat. It's a lot kinder than talking about issues, God knows. Words have their limits is what I'm trying to say, and, in the messiness of life, they're usually completely inadequate.

I loved her email, though. It was a wonderful accounting of how something really happens, and how it leaves us speechless and unsettled. I could picture her throughout all of it: at odds with herself and dissatisfied. Today I thought about her while I grocery shopped. I thought how the warm and human heart will necessarily feel pain. I thought that a willingness to have messy conversations requires its own kind of bravery. It takes courage to wade into murky waters, feeling lost and discombobulated when the popular culture urges us to be cold, complete, and slick. She's admirable for keeping it real, for staying honest when few people are.

Naturally, from my bloggy perch, I'd like to write something stirring. Maybe paste on a moral or something. But that's not needed, and it's certainly not desired.

I'm just glad K. reminded me: life is bigger than words.

A lot bigger.