It came from the sky.
It fell upon a twelve-year-old's trampoline as the sun lit up the clouds something unbelievable, each quadrant of the sky a different color, texture, and feeling. The west held awe and strength and beauty, beams of light washing over the tops of towering clouds. North was fear, a hazy orange, brush strokes of chalk like the smoke of a forest fire. East was a powerful sort of gray; east knew, east dreaded, east was the feeling in your gut every morning when you can't get out of bed and you know you should eat but can't because you feel it there, the clouds inside. A threatening sort of thunder. South though, south was the sort of tickled love in your fingertips, a pink fluffy giggling feeling that makes you want to run as fast as you can through an astroturf football field in the snow.
"Take in the cancers like compliments."
I knew the words of course, I had them memorized like textbook flashcards, but it was only then I realized what they meant.
Take in the cancers like compliments.
The sun emits UV rays that are harmful to the skin, that build tumors that eat up your life source.
Go outside and soak them up. Soak them up like the sweetest of poisons, and when you are freckled and sunburned, when you are aged and brown, do not look upon the marks as insults. Touch the sun back.
The question implied is this: What greater compliment is there than to be touched by life? To be burned, cut open, eaten alive? Take it all in stride, take it in like medicine, the bad alongside the good. It may hurt but at least you feel something. What greater compliment is there than to be shined down upon?
I laughed on the trampoline as the clouds closed in. Laughed as the rain fell in big fat tears, plopping onto my nose, my glasses. Laughed as the twelve-year-old laughed with me, not because I told her why I was laughing, but because it felt good to be a part of something. Cancer runs in her family. Her grandmother is dead.
So I didn't tell her about the compliment of sorrow because she knows more than me. She knows how to laugh back at the sun that kills us. She knows how to laugh as the rain turns to hail, as we run back inside and the sky thunders and bellows, as the sirens start and the clouds clap and flash, as the streets turn to rivers of whitewater. She knows.
The sun went down and the storm fell like an omen, the eastern sky growing so great it dropped down upon us, a sorrow so heavy it could not be held. A sorrow so heavy it could not stay in bed, it had to get up. It had to make coffee.
It fell upon a twelve-year-old's trampoline as the sun lit up the clouds something unbelievable, each quadrant of the sky a different color, texture, and feeling. The west held awe and strength and beauty, beams of light washing over the tops of towering clouds. North was fear, a hazy orange, brush strokes of chalk like the smoke of a forest fire. East was a powerful sort of gray; east knew, east dreaded, east was the feeling in your gut every morning when you can't get out of bed and you know you should eat but can't because you feel it there, the clouds inside. A threatening sort of thunder. South though, south was the sort of tickled love in your fingertips, a pink fluffy giggling feeling that makes you want to run as fast as you can through an astroturf football field in the snow.
The tree branches spread out against the sky, clear blue just in the center. The sun reached down and sank into my skin with the same pleasant discomfort that comes with holding hands. I squeezed my eyes shut and watched the blackness slowly redden, each cell of my skin filled with the warmth of a setting sun.
Wind whipped through my shirt, tickling and taunting the threadbare button-down and I laughed, opening my eyes. It was then that it came to me, right down from the sky above:
Wind whipped through my shirt, tickling and taunting the threadbare button-down and I laughed, opening my eyes. It was then that it came to me, right down from the sky above:
"Take in the cancers like compliments."
It was January when he said it. Worrying I don't get enough vitamin D, which is true, I don't lie in the sun enough. It feels like being touched. It brushes its hands over your arms and face, feels beneath your clothes. The sun is intrusive, it touches you in a way that makes you seen. I never used to let myself be touched, but now I hug everyone. Now I lie in the sun.
I knew the words of course, I had them memorized like textbook flashcards, but it was only then I realized what they meant.
Take in the cancers like compliments.
The sun emits UV rays that are harmful to the skin, that build tumors that eat up your life source.
Go outside and soak them up. Soak them up like the sweetest of poisons, and when you are freckled and sunburned, when you are aged and brown, do not look upon the marks as insults. Touch the sun back.
The question implied is this: What greater compliment is there than to be touched by life? To be burned, cut open, eaten alive? Take it all in stride, take it in like medicine, the bad alongside the good. It may hurt but at least you feel something. What greater compliment is there than to be shined down upon?
I laughed on the trampoline as the clouds closed in. Laughed as the rain fell in big fat tears, plopping onto my nose, my glasses. Laughed as the twelve-year-old laughed with me, not because I told her why I was laughing, but because it felt good to be a part of something. Cancer runs in her family. Her grandmother is dead.
So I didn't tell her about the compliment of sorrow because she knows more than me. She knows how to laugh back at the sun that kills us. She knows how to laugh as the rain turns to hail, as we run back inside and the sky thunders and bellows, as the sirens start and the clouds clap and flash, as the streets turn to rivers of whitewater. She knows.
The sun went down and the storm fell like an omen, the eastern sky growing so great it dropped down upon us, a sorrow so heavy it could not be held. A sorrow so heavy it could not stay in bed, it had to get up. It had to make coffee.
The importance of the revelation from the sky is that it takes away the bitterness of storms, of sunburnt skin, of the things that eat away and kill. These things are made easier to swallow, through the warmth of sunlight and the beauty of clouds. The sorrow and suffering of this world is a terrible truth, it really is. But there is love in this world, and hatred is a choice, and I hadn't realized that before. A bad life is still living.
Maybe it's all bullcrap optimism, but it feels good. And I'd rather feel good than bad.
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