It’s dark in the sunroom this morning, hours before the sun comes up. The wall of windows reflects the light from my lamp, the end table, my own face. I come here in the early quiet, pour the coffee, let out the dog, sit with a blanket, and listen as the yard wakes up behind me.
What stories will I tell today?
Today is finally April but most of the trees don’t know it yet. A long winter has kept them sleeping right on through March. The little ones wake up first, shooting out flowers at the end of skinny sticks, coloring the cul-de-sac in light pinks and yellows.
It won’t be long now.
I think about those of you in the southern hemisphere, how your April season is our October. Is that right? Are you heading into cooler weather, watching as the trees close their eyes for a season?
Even the most predictable process to me is the opposite somewhere else. We all have our perspectives, don’t we?
This year’s (in)Real Life theme comes to mind – We Need Your Story – And we do, whoever you are. Because it’s different from ours, from hers, from mine.
We are all telling our stories everyday we live. Some do it with words like our friend Lisa-Jo – attorney, mother, writer, superhero – with her brand new book releasing today, Surprised by Motherhood: Everything I Never Expected about Being a Mom
Some do it with their crazy ideas, like my friend Haley who launches a children’s clothing line today – Wildly Co. – and I can’t even get my mind around this girl and her fun, thoughtful, wild ideas. If someone dangled me over a cliff and said they would save me if I would launch a children’s clothing line, I would just have to go ahead and fall because how in the world do you do that?!
But Haley tells this part of her story because it’s hers.
Then there is my son at the breakfast table this morning with an endless string of Your shoe’s untied APRIL FOOLS! You have something on your nose APRIL FOOLS! The sky is falling APRIL FOOLS!
He tells his stories, too.
Each of us will speak today, some into microphones, others near the microwave. We will speak with our movements, our meals, our routines, our laughter, our compassion, our grief, our to-do lists.
What will we say?
Will we speak hope, love, fear, or truth? Will we say it to thousands or only to one? Will we say it out loud or only in secret?
Maybe we’ll say it all. Maybe that’s alright. Maybe we’ll learn something or teach something or remember something or surprise ourselves. Maybe today will be the same as yesterday. Maybe that’s alright, too.
Let’s respect the loud and the quiet alike. Let’s not elevate the big stories over the small ones. Let’s honor, celebrate, and speak in whatever ways we can today.
Today, on this regular Tuesday, what is the story you’re speaking with your life?
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