In Favor of Awaiting the Answer to "How Are You," Appreciation of the Ringing Phone, and My Friend Aaron.

Sometimes, the ringing phone interrupts your thoughts and on the other end, cutting through the static, is exactly the voice you needed to hear, saying exactly the thing you didn’t know you needed. Today, I was in the midst of a truly epic set of mood swings as I continued attempting to mentally catalogue the recent loss of one of my oldest friends, the discovery of family I didn’t know existed, and the new knowledge that even my family’s secrets have secrets, and it wasn’t going well. My anxiety is at what may be an all time high and, as many people who know me (and some unfortunate strangers who just happened to ask “how are you”?) know, it’s been a rough few weeks.

This morning, it wasn’t yet dawn before my brain had reached the point where I couldn’t file fast enough and the mental index cards on which I’ve been charting recently acquired information upended, resembling a card catalogue in a library of ghosts moments after an earthquake. Scattered. No rhyme or reason to any of it. Broken. By whatever hour it was when the phone rang, I had lost all sense of time. It no longer even feels like it was today, actually.

The display on my phone said it was my friend, Aaron, whose nick of time presence in my life is nearly enough to convince an atheist of something higher at play. Aaron and I don’t talk all the time, but today, he had some time and used some of it to call me. Nice, right?

The conversation went like this:

Me: (Relieved) Oh my gosh. I’m so glad it’s you.

Aaron: How are you?

Me: Angry.

Aaron: (Suddenly confused. This is probably not the call he was expecting.) “Why are you angry”?

Me: (Choking on tears) “Because I’m sad. I’m angry because I’m sad and I hate being sad or I hate myself for being sad; I’m not sure.

Aaron: So, you’re angry. That’s great! Welcome to the next step. 

…and I laughed. It was that easy.  

The wonder of this exchange and what made it so nice is that he didn’t change the subject when I responded with something other than sunshine and rainbows. What he did was recognize where I was at and remind me it isn’t forever. That all of this is a process and, with any process, there are steps. And moreover, it’s okay if right now I’m sitting here with my post-earthquake card catalogue in a library of ghosts. I was probably trying to file too fast, anyway. 

(Thank you, Aaron. I adore you.)