openness

We miss out when we choose not to take a second look.

I wanted to share this song with you. It’s absolutely beautiful and makes me smile. The melody captured my heart the very first time I heard it what seems like so long ago now, and it brought me back to a time where men and women touched when they danced, and would gaze lovingly into each other’s eyes. I close my eyes and see a couple gliding, graceful, in harmony, in love. It prompted me to find out what the words as sung so beautifully by the late Ibrahim Ferrer, meant.

I’m glad I did.

So many people don’t care to make the effort of getting to the meaning, never understanding fully what is conveyed by words and things that are foreign to us. But when we do, we may discover the emotions underlying the words are universal. They’re often foreign in a very superficial way.

How it was.
I can’t tell you how it was.
Nor can I explain what happened,
but I fell in love with you.

A light that lit up my whole being.
Your laugh, like a spring,
filled my life with unease.

Was it your eyes, or your mouth?
Your lips or your voice?
Maybe it was the impatience
of waiting so long for you.
More, I can’t say, I can’t say how it was
nor can I explain what happened
but I fell in love with you.

It’s so easy to keep from peeling the layers. I mean, it can be tedious work to try and get to the core of something or someone. Sometimes it makes us uncomfortable. There can be unpleasant layers, ones that are not compatible with whom we believe we are or the even way we normally view and categorize the world. Sadly, very few people are actually willing to look deeper. And they miss out. But that is their choice to make. That makes me sad, but I know enough that although I can voice that sadness, it may mean nothing to those I cry for.

It’s fascinating really how random words you come across will often resonate so deeply when they can be linked to a situation you are thrust into.

“We don't always get to choose what we love.”
-Scott Westerfeld, The Last Days, 2006

And something for me to look forward to as I grow older... Maybe I’ll even be able to live it now rather than later.

« I have enjoyed greatly the second blooming that comes when you finish the life of the emotions and of personal relations; and suddenly find - at the age of fifty, say - that a whole new life has opened before you, filled with things you can think about, study, or read about...It is as if a fresh sap of ideas and thoughts was rising in you. »
Agatha Christie (1890 - 1976), An Autobiography, 1977