a small resurrection

she looked at me and said, "i don't think you lost yourself. i think you have just been in pain for so long that you forgot what it felt like to be you. but that is different from being gone. you are still there. i can still see you. and maybe finding yourself again is not about becoming who you were before. maybe it is about learning that some parts of you went quiet just to keep you alive. you did not lose anything. you are not gone. you are coming back."

outside the bar, with smoke between us and the music still leaking through the door, i believed her.