The morning commute frantically passed along the street and through the precinct of shops.
There a café, its few outside tables with striped umbrellas offering shelter, long ceramic pots with flowers and greenery giving separation from the roadway.
She was sitting at one of the tables. Her coffee, notebook and pen nestled together. And though the café was in the shadow of a neighbouring building, she was enveloped in sunlight.
A captivating vision, as her golden hair glowed and her gracious form contrasted against the shadowy café in the background. The scene presenting like a painting from one of the masters.
Her eyes closed, she tilted her head to the sun and enjoyed its warmth on her face.
Alone she sat. Lost. Her journal open, its page blank, as these jumbled thoughts ran through her mind.
She was in deep melancholy. A sadness of loss was mostly all she was feeling and it frustrated her, depressed her.
The loss she was feeling, so deep and not what she could really express in her journal. And so, its page remained blank. All she could understand is it was a feeling for a friendship that was fractured and she did not know how to heal it or repair it.
She had tried to. Kept communication going, but the responses that came made her feel it was an effort for the other party. Just a politeness that came with a reluctance to engage.
And that made her more intensely miserable to her depths.
She realised too late what had unwound the connection. She had been open and honest, but too honest in such a new friendship. It was a risk of exposing and of openness not common to her, but that she felt needed to be taken. Yet it was clear she had said too much, gone too far even though sincere.
And now though admitting fault with a willingness to try to repair things, it seemed a friendship she had grown to value may now be lost.
She sipped the coffee, felt pain sinking like a heavy weight on her chest, pressing down. So deep in her being was the feeling of loss. The cup almost slipping from her grasp as for a moment she was lost.
Then it came. A presence, a sound slowly drawing her attention.
It was music coming from somewhere, a radio or a recording, she could not tell. But it was so clear it could have even been musicians somewhere close. She was not a listener of music generally but she recognised it as being the sound of classical music as it distracted her rambling mind.
The meandering tune wafted towards her as the sounds of the string instruments came to her, resting next to her. It was like the wand from the conductor was drawing through the fog and chaos she was in. As if it was moving to cut a path through the mist of thoughts and sadness, and had settled into her with its melodious calm.
What was happening! Why now was it that to her she seemed to be enveloped by this music? That even the light around her now appeared more intense and clearer, and it seemed she had been paused in time. Then as if tied to the moment came recognition, a crystal realisation revealing what it was she had been feeling. All this time it had been grief.
Grief had been settling in her, but now that needed to change. She understood there was little more she could do than what she was doing. What was in her control was to keep the door open to the friendship. Hope that it could be restored. Own the disappointment if it is not, but don’t stay in that space and walk into the next day.
The music had given her the quietness of thought she had needed.
Moved her from the feelings of sadness, regret and emptiness. To a place she needed to be. Providing her with a gift of peace.
More importantly, delivering a moment to also love herself again, something that up to then had been lost.
Finishing her coffee, she gathered her notebook and pen. Only then did she look down at a simple drawing in the top corner of the page she must have absentmindedly done. A doodle of a balloon with a string dangling free, she smiled and walked away.
Footnote: Years later in an equally serendipitous moment, she again encountered the music. This time she found the title and the composer. Claude Debussy had composed the piece ‘La fille aux cheveux de lin’. Amazingly it had come from the land of her birth. But more so the title meaning was the surprise. Then came astonishment as its source of inspiration was connected to her name, ‘Lisle’. It seemed that at that time, now some years passed, that when she first heard the music this beautiful tune was somehow guided to her when she needed it most.
(Words and Images Copyright 2022 Kevin Palmer)