Journal Entry #4

A morning at the cinema

Today I saw Hamnet. Even though I cried my eyes out and I felt a deep sorrow…I felt something else. I felt seen and understood completely in a way that I never knew was possible. In a way I had only hoped I would one day be seen.

This movie is like a drop of ink in a glass of water. It’s all over me and it’s everywhere and I’ll never forget it. A morning showing, I had a coffee and so did Allison. An older man by himself two rows ahead. A couple to the left of me and another man by himself in the front row. When the lights dimmed and the greenery filled the screen. There was no turning back.

I held back the sobs that wanted to rip through my chest as I witnessed one of the greatest pieces of art. So shockingly beautiful I wondered if my soul had chosen this path if only to see this film, and this film alone. How could I leave this seat? How could I gather my things, how could I gather myself. But somehow I did. Only to fall apart once again as we sat motionless in my car. Music was too loud, the sound of my own voice was too loud. Grief was loud. And I watched as my friend wiped tears from her eyes knowing that she had witnessed the same beauty and understood it completely.

“He loves me for who I am, not who I ought to be.” A life that contains a room with a table messily covered in stories and ideas for new ones. A kitchen full of herbs picked from the garden right outside the window. A knowing that if we listen, the earth speaks to us, we work in tandem. A love that knows in an instant, life is meant to be lived together. A home with children full of love, laughter and creativity. Understanding and room for two lives to be lived completely, separately and together.

Now I know, something that someone wanted hundreds of years ago, something that someone wrote years ago is something I desire today. A feeling threaded so deeply in humanity time cannot even contain it. A story that must be told over and over again. A story that must be lived again and again.

It very much felt like a part of me was explained. So now I don’t have to.

But my god how I’ve literally dreamed of this life. For a man not to complete me but to meet me in my dreams. For a man to meet me in the life we build together. To love me and see me fully. That is what I wish for.

Thank you for joining me in my short series Journal Entries, next week the series will conclude. What has been your favorite moment of this short series so far?

Collage by me.