. . .but for God in heaven, 'tis but the dawn
The above quote isn't by a famous author, philosopher, or person. It wasn't said in a private interview or into a microphone before a crowd of people. It was by my friend, Brooke, and it was never said. It was written.
Some of the most beautiful things in life are seen. Some are felt. Some are heard. Some are smelt. Some are tasted. And some are read. But what these beautiful "things" have in common is that they are found in the most unlikely places.
Brooke's father died when she was ten, but I hadn't known that until a few months after we had met and become friends. She was telling me a funny story about her mother going on a date, and I asked, "oh are your parents divorced?" and she said, "oh, no, my dad died when I was 10." Then she joked, "That was when I got a little chubby. You know, overeating and all that."
I didn't think about it, but a little while later she showed me a poem she had written when her father had died. It was dirty and ripped in a few places, but it was typed up very neatly. I can't remember most of it, because I only read it once. But I can remember my reaction. I can remember hearing the words in my head and being totally immersed in that ripped up piece of paper.
I told her it was amazing, and I wasn't lying. I've had friends who showed me their writing and I've gone "wow, that was good" when it really was totally bland and unoriginal. But this, what Brooke wrote, was something else. It was so beautifully written, and perfectly formulated, that I couldn't believe she had actually been capable of writing something like that.
I told her she could go places with writing like that, but she said it was a one-time thing, something personal. I don't think she's written anything like that since. At least, none that I could see.
So we're all writers. Even when we don't see it in most people. Okay, so maybe not all of us are writers, but we really are. When we talk, when we feel, when we live, we are writers. Our lives are pages of notebooks just ready to be written. The people who are defined as writers, by newspeople, by the public, are the ones who wish to share their notebooks with the world. Maybe some of us don't want to. Maybe the best of us don't want to.
The best writing in the world is found in places you didn't expect to find it in. I found it in my friend, Brooke.
