Lonely

Today I was feeling lonely. I'm never alone for long, but was feeling the need to connect with my friends. As the morning ticked along, I was fragmented, distracted.

With a cup of fresh hot coffee as my companion, I braced against the cold eastern winter morning. We keep winter clothes hanging in the entryways here...gloves, scarves, nice warm coats, an extra sweatshirt...

I bundled up and stepped outside onto the front porch. Anytime I step outside I close my eyes and turn in a circle a couple of times so I won't know which direction I'm facing, then open my eyes and try to see everything in my line of sight like I've never seen it before that moment.

When I looked up at the sky, facing east, I saw the sun beginning to wake up and knew that that sun was the same one my friends would be looking at today. I saw some high, wispy clouds floating eastward and knew that some of my friends would look up and see clouds in their cities and know that those clouds had passed over my head at one point in the day, most likely.

It's really not easy to feel lonely when you know you share the stuff that nature is made of.