A Friday Story

Dear friends,

sometimes there is a special meaning into everyday life, and there is a special meaning into little moments too. I'm sure you'll read this post next week because of my schedule. I want to tell you about special moments because today occurred to me. A moment which has nothing special but its authenticity and simplicity. Indeed, it is a short story itself. Please, let me tell you what happened.

It is Friday. One of those specific days that make you say the famous quote Thank God it's Friday. It has been an intense week. Full of tasks. Full of rain too. Today the sun is up in the sky. Glorious, warm, surrounded by nothing but blue. Everything in this day invites you to go outside and enjoy the world. I'm tempted to close my notebook, take my wellies, and go for a long walk with Chelsea. The anticipation of relaxing over the weekend, read read read, is pressing my mind to persuade my body. I don't want to resist. The notebook is closed on the desk, my feet are comfortably wrapped in wellies, Chelsea is wagging excited for the walk.

In a blink we are outside.

There is always something uncomfortable in being outside. That whisper in my head warning I'm not totally safe, everything may happen. I don't listen. The walk is lovely, it seems spring. People cross our path, cars ride in the street, busses punctually stop letting passengers on and off. I don't look to anybody. Not their faces. I'm quite scared of faces. Mostly of eyes. People's soul is rooted in their eyes. Sometimes you may see good things in them, sometimes not. I only see half bodies crossing roads, crowding pavements, talking. There are mothers with children, business men. A florist is trying to convince a woman to buy sunflowers instead of roses, three retired men talk about sport drinking cappuccinos. I see everybody, but look at none of them. I think about the book I'm writing, about my husband, my family, Chelsea, what will I make for dinner?

The walk is lovely, we are back soon.

Few hours later, a cat seems lost in the neighborhood. He -or she- is looking at me with big yellow eyes in the middle of the street. A woman is crying a very kitten name. I hold the fluffy thing and follow the voice. The woman is standing on the threshold, hands on the sides of her mouth, crying. I've seen that person few times, but never spoke a word with her.

Is he what you are looking for? I ask, holding the kitten in front of me.

Her face melt in a smile. Oh, thank you darling, she says, you made my day. I think she is on a mission to find new ways to make me worry. You see, there are too many cars on the streets. What a little thing like her can do with them?

I nod and place the cat in her harms.

Thank you. She says. Please, come inside, darling, would you like a cup of coffee?

I don't tell her my name, she doesn't tell me hers. We are in the kitchen. A white linen curtain before the window lets foresee some green and brown outside. A garden and a fence? The light hits an old table, one of those that has sustained many dinners for a family with little children, seeing them becoming teenagers, then adults, then adults coming back home with grandchildren, who came home with great-grandchildren. Yes, it is one of those tables that is the simplest, but alto the more significant, for all the stories that have been told sitting at it. There are blue and white tiles covering the wall behind, they are old, at least as old as the table. Everything in this home is old. Everything has a story to tell.

The woman sits. The light pervades her thin grey hair, that now seems ever more thin, almost ethereal.

Please, have a sit, dear. She says indicating a chair next to the table. I obey.

She looks at me. I'm not scared about her eyes. Brown. Tired. Surrounded by wrinkles. But still glimmering with life. Gentle, welcoming, warming. Eyes of a grandmother. She says I'm wearing a nice dress. Thank you. She says she is cooking polenta for dinner. I say it is delicious, I say I made it two days a go. She smiles. I smile.

I think I'm stupid, my brain is totally blank and can't find something to speak about. I have the occasion to add a little bit of a story at that table, and the only thing I'm able to speak about is polenta. The kitten meows.

The rest of the room is covered with pictures, held together with tape. Many people are framed into them. Children, nieces, grandchildren. They all smile an eternal smile. I feel like an intruder, a thief stealing her memories and private moments of life. I don't even know her name, but I'm here sat in her kitchen, discovering what her family looks like. What her coffee tastes like. What her solitude sounds like.

Among all, there is an image of a woman walking with self-consciousness and elegance in a black and white world, her girls next to her. It is an old picture, nobody smiles.

The one on the right is my mum, and those are my sisters and I, she says.

She tells me she misses her sisters, she misses them so much. I'm stuck by these words because I know are true. Someone's sadness becomes real when you know it has a face, or in this case more than one, faces of sisters and a mother. Lives in a frame that have been and are no more, except one.

I say the photograph is beautiful. She says it is painful. The kitten mews.

May your day be infused with sublime words.

Xoxo Connelly