Here Comes the Sun

"I found the bracelet that they gave everyone the day we saw the Dali Lama. It made me think of you."

I remember taking the second one and instantly feeling a little wrong about it. I mean, they were free, but it was a big love fest in the arena that day. It felt weird to be a little...greedy?

I wore the first one for a good couple of years. I took it off the day I was a bridesmaid in my best friend's wedding. She didn't ask me to but somehow I couldn't justify a braided bracelet with sea foam satin.

It was totally sea foam.

I've been thinking about Buddhism. I very much feel connected to it though I haven't yet sat down and studied it. I know that the message it shares is to see the world with kind eyes and be compassionate to one another. That's definitely something I believe in. I know that Tibetan prayer flags are hung so that the prayers written on them can be carried from the wind into the universe. I know that if you're really quiet with yourself, if you just listen to what your self is telling you-the right choices will be made.

When we got the bracelets, they came with a bead and three strands of yellow, blue and green thread. You were to ask the person next to you to braid it and then tie it on your wrist. It was a sign of friendship with someone you didn't know-or at least that's how I interpreted it. That sunny day I met someone that would end up being very important to me. The second, untied bracelet waited in my pocket.

There are a ton of little places in my apartment that I just...put things. If it's a coffee cup that I think is too pretty to drink out of it become a pen holder. I have cat dishes with random little bits of things you might need in them because they were too 'cute' for cat food. Candle holders with minuscule bits of wax become a place that pony tail holders live.  I don't know why and it doesn't really matter. But tonight I happened to look up at the shelf on my desk. I  had just filled my water bottle and was about to settle into an evening of some serious Pinteresting when I saw the loose threads of the second bracelet hanging from a cup/now pen holder. I smiled.

As soon as I started braiding, I knew it was time for me to wear it again. This time, I'd be braiding the threads myself, because...I'm going to be a friend to me now. As I entwined the colors together, my thoughts went to the last few weeks and I noticed the braid went a little crooked. Before, when I'd been quiet with myself, it had been perfectly straight. I stopped for a moment and swallowed, closed my eyes. I gave myself permission to feel sad about things. I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, started braiding again, finished it. Tying it on my own wrist was a little tricky and I might have to have a friend tighten it up, but it's there, reminding me of kindness and compassion and hope and love and warmth. It's there to remind me to give those things to myself.

That's definitely something I believe in.


I don't think it was greedy to take the second one anymore. I think I was supposed to have it for right now. Finding the bracelet was such a perfectly timed reminder in a world that is desperately imperfect. It came when I needed to remember that kindness and compassion and hope and love and warmth are the things that I love about this life. Why would I spend my time feeling anything else?

I'm not unrealistic of course. I know I'm gonna get pissed sometimes. I'm going to cry and rant about bullshit. I'm going to have moments. But I can try and focus on letting them be only that-moments. I'll breathe or cry or scream through them and come out the other side of it.

Today I feel like I'm going to be ok.