We should have the right to have someone leave when we want, to only allow those in who we want in. But the truth is, people can force their way into your life whenever they choose. If they want to remind you forevermore that they exist, they will. They can reappear in a card or call or a "chance" meeting, they can remember your birthday or the day you met with some innocuous small note. No matter how little they matter in your new life, they can insist on being seen and recognized and remembered.
Deb CalettiAnd pity--people who inspire it in you are actually very powerful people. To get someone else to take care of you, to feel sorry for you--that takes a lot of strength, smarts, manipulation. Very powerful people.
Deb CalettiI was like a chocolate in a box, looking well behaved and perfect in place, all the while harboring a secret center.
Deb CalettiIt was a shut door, and shut doors meant things kept to yourself. There were reasons you kept things to yourself, and they usually werenโt good, happy, open-air sort of reasons. Still, I didnโt want to see behind that door. You think you want to know everything there is to know about everything there is to know. But you donโt. Not really. I had pried the lid off of the dark places of another person before, I had seen inside. Down deep. You donโt want to look at whatโs rotting there.
Deb CalettiRejection, though--it could make the loss of someone you weren't even that crazy about feel gut wrenching and world ending.
Deb CalettiFamily was even a bigger word than I imagined, wide and without limitations, if you allowed it, defying easy definition. You had family that was supposed to be family and wasn't, family that wasn't family but was, halves becoming whole, wholes splitting into two; it was possible to lack whole, honest love and connection from family in lead roles, yet to be filled to abundance by the unexpected supporting players.
Deb Caletti