February 21, 2016

Breathe. // This has been a week of challenging conversations, of family health scares, and of trying to understand what, exactly, it means to have a God who answers prayers. Sometimes, even when you’re a writer, you run out of words, and when I do, I find myself gravitating toward dance, the thing I learned to love before I learned to write. I quit at eighteen, and I wish I hadn’t. But back then, I didn’t believe there was room in my life for more than one form of devotion. Around that same time, Anna Nalick’s song “Breathe” became an anthem for me. Now I listen to it mainly for these lines in the chorus: “No one can find the rewind button, girl / So cradle your head in your hands / And breathe…just breathe.” No one can find the rewind button, but maybe, that’s good. Maybe, if all we can do is move forward, then we don’t have to stay in these cycles of destruction: of letting go of what we love without knowing why. Many years and many injuries later, I could never go back to being the dancer I once was. But maybe I’m okay with that. Maybe that just means I now have the chance to love it in unexpected ways.