Postcard on Life Lately

Life’s a funny guy!

Firstly, I apologize for not writing to you last week. I tried but I just couldn’t. There was a lot going on. There’s still a lot going on.

To be honest, I've been in a bit of a limbo. I recently lost someone dear to me, and the permanence of it all—the nerve-wracking grief—has left me feeling cut off at the knees. But I'm here, holding on for dear life because just one tilt and it could all be over.

In spite of all that’s been happening, I’ve managed to see beyond the pain. There’s a lesson here. I’m not new to grief. We shook hands quite early in life, and it’s an emotion I’m all too familiar with. But as an adult, I haven’t experienced a loss that has shaken me to my core until now.

What I’ve learned from this ongoing experience is that, as writers, emotions are crucial because they form the basis of every piece we create. Whatever you write is designed to evoke some sort of emotion: anger, happiness, empathy, rage, and so on. It’s a blessing to have felt those emotions firsthand because it helps you project a more realistic picture.

This is not to say you cannot write about an emotion you’ve never felt. There is, of course, a place for secondhand experience in storytelling or writing of other sorts.

Observation is as valuable as experience. Rather, I invite you into a space where you see yourself as an alchemist, welcoming every wave life pushes to your shores with open arms, knowing that it is a blessing to be able to feel what you are writing. A space where you can transform even the rawest emotions into compelling magic in your writing.

While we pray for good tidings only, we know that life moves in ebbs and flows. I pray that we find the strength to deal with our ebbs with as much grace as we deal with our flows. I am currently in a low ebb, but I pray to crawl out sooner rather than later.

Life’s a funny guy but thankfully, I’m a giggly girl. Joke’s on him!