If I close my eyes and picture only the sun, it warms me, melts me, holds me. And that helps. Gosh, being held helps so much. Being real, broken, small, scared in a place that holds you is the most wonderful; the safest.

There was a closet in the house I grew up in. The doors were made of reflective glass that seemed to extend through time and space. It held my every memory, every smile, every tear, and every fear. The mirrors of this closet were one of my safe places. A place where I felt seen and heard and known, because the only face I could see staring back at me was always my own. And of all the people in this world, she would understand. This has been a big source of laughs as I grew up and is still talked about now, which is just fine. Over the years my skin grew very thick to criticism and before I knew better, I spent many minutes and many wasted words attempting to describe the way that I feel and the reason for feeling it. And in every single one of those moments, I am brought back to the closet with the mirrors, in the house between the parks and the lakes. The closet of my sorrows and my dreams. The place where the only face I saw gazing back at me was one that reflected the same pain and anguish I was trying so hard to hide.