Day 41

I ended the evening with my daughter in the living room. No phones, no television, no music. Just the soft static and sighs of a house settling in for the night with its people.

I held the moment with her as long as I could. Laughing like twelve year old girls. Where purity and presence in silliness is downright sacred. A private clubhouse filled with no expectations. No bras allowed. I’m not 45 and she’s not 21; we are just us and we love each other.

It’s the second time today I realized how truly god-like we are as humans and our superpower is language. I’m talking magic and miracles, touch and be healed, kind of power and it’s deployed in our voice.

Power that can literally alter the course of another person’s life.

It happened to me at 8:47 this morning when a classmate from high school messaged me much needed words of encouragement. Just an unexpected little spill of kindness that pooled in my chest and spread like a sunrise.

One moment I was an employee bracing for the day and the next I was the me that God made.

Joy Novak if you’re reading this, you should know you did that today.

I suppose I just feel that it is every bit as important to acknowledge love as it is to give it. Maybe our superpowers multiply when we use them together.

Good Lord, I need to go to bed or at least try. I had to write and I will every day. It is a commitment I have made to myself and I’m not going to break it.

I’ve dreaded even thinking the words “this time it will be different,” much less saying it out loud. But you know what, this time won’t be different than all the other times I’ve tried to stay sober.

This time I will be different.

I will.

Love,

Sobriety Poet