coincidences
Someone I used to know first showed me the spoken word version of this essay years ago.
“Someone I used to know” sounds derivative — it was an ex-lover. But I suppose the original statement is true — time passes and people grow and change without you, and you grow apart and you no longer know them, or rather, you know them as their past self, but not them now. Like your parents, who knew you as a child but have to meet you again as an adult, you have to meet your former friends and lovers in new settings wherever they are at.
Hello, nice to meet you (again). What have you been up to since we shared a bed and it wasn’t weird to brush past each other.
Do you believe in coincidences?
I like to think even chance encounters are fated.
Recently, the famous “Wear Sunscreen” essay/spoken word song/speech has been popping up for me, in bizarre places. In an email list, a brand sent the whole written part to me. In a book I’m finishing, it made its way in the end.
It’s a wonderful essay.
It’s a wonderful spoken word piece.
A lovely way to knock out the old year or ring in the new one. Filled with nice reminders. Everything is temporary. You can read it here. You can listen to Baz Lurhmann’s spoken word version here.
I like to think that everything happens for a reason.
It gives me comfort and peace and lets me think that there’s something bigger than me (there is), that I’m on some type of predetermined path (I am) and that I can categorize all instances into lessons or blessings (which one is she?). It helps me detach, if only slightly, from outcome or result, and zoom out, knowing that, even if I can’t full see or understand it, there is, somewhere, an artist painting a bigger picture.
Some people just come into your life to fill a gap.
Hello, nice to meet you. Where have you been all this time? I’ve opened all the drawers looking for you in between the spice jars.
I’m soft at heart and easy to hurt, I think.
A lovergirl by nature.
I want to show you my heart, my insides. I open all my cupboards and reveal what’s inside. My apartment, my little museum. Come, stay a while. Sign the guestbook while you’re here.
But I want to be harder, look more inward. I can be distant, too.
“Wear Sunscreen” showing up so many times in the last few weeks feels strange. There must be a message there for me. Something from the past, a fossil of a memory stirs. I remember the first time I ever heard it, not all the details but the feeling. I can’t bring myself to listen, so I just read the text. But then, is it really that deep? You know Occam’s Razor. Keep it simple. Perhaps the message is just what it is: Wear fucking sunscreen. Botox can only do so much.