If you would like, listen to Abandon the Rule by ELIZA while you read this. I think that the headphones bring out the bass. You can feel it as much as hear it.
Her voice is tender. The music is decisive, the bass strong, the words bold. All of that exists in one song. It sounds like how I feel now.
“We abandon the rule, we abandon the order.”
Some rules are disguised as common sense. Be understanding. Do not make a scene. Make room for everyone. A woman can spend decades living by them before it occurs to her to ask who wrote them, and by what authority. Sometimes the question never comes. A whole life can be spent obeying an order no one had the right to give.
If we are lucky, the bubble bursts. The whole process hurts. Even when you wanted it to happen, even when you tried to make it happen yourself, you can grieve what falls away. You can be frightened and relieved at the same time. Then the air changes. The noise begins to fade, and you realise how much of your life you spent listening for it.
You begin to see people more clearly, too. The full spectrum. Those who take up all the space they can, and those who quietly make some for you.
Someone recently told me that mazel tov can be said when people come together and when they part. I do not know if that is always true, but I love the thought. We know how to celebrate a beginning. Perhaps we should also celebrate the courage of an ending, and the life it makes room for.
The past year and a half has changed me. The pressure became so immense that change felt less like a choice than a matter of survival. The past month and a half has been different. The noise has gone quiet. Friends and family have surrounded me with a love that asks for nothing complicated. They call, they show up, they make me laugh. With room to breathe, I have begun to care for myself and pay attention to my own thoughts. I keep discovering things about myself I did not know were there.
A friend mentioned the pressure that turns carbon into a diamond. I would never say the pressure was worth it. But I understand now how extraordinary it feels when it lifts. Things that made no sense before are becoming clear. I can see what I want to carry forward, and what I can leave behind.
That is what I hear in the song: tenderness carried by something strong. An open door. A place at the table. The possibility of love without fear, and a life I can choose deliberately.
Today, I feel lighter than I have in a long time. The wings are still drying, perhaps. But the survival part is over. I can be soft and certain at once. And for the first time I can remember, I am excited about everything that comes next.
Mazel tov.
Leave a comment