Return To Sender

The people who want to share their stories with you will. When they feel you see the whole of who they are, or perhaps they trust you to leave enough space for who they're trying to be.

I’ve always liked people who see the whole person.

The ones that remember how much you like a particular jacket, or send you a song that made them think of your cheekbones, or the way you eat your pasta with a spoon and not a fork, even if that choice is the definition of blasphemy.

Enter the apartment and go first to the bookshelf. The books will say a lot about a person; spines outward? Or are you looking at the cream/beige/whites of creased and handled pages? Move on from the titles, and look for talismans. Are they gathered from faraway places? Do they remind you of luck or do they make you feel sorrow? What is standing sentinel, and whom is it for?

Enter framed photographs in evidence, what is it they took the time to place? Photo strips are worth five points, a stray seashell another three. Are there postcards on the fridge? A “return to sender” stamp smudging across the reds, golds, and greens of the image. Now look at the magnets. What’s their story?

Inspect the closet, search for soft sweaters, rifle through the bathroom cupboards, and count all the mugs. Now it may sound like you’re snooping, but a space can be a version of someone that you have to really look to see. And, if you don’t feel like combing through things, seeding them out slowly in this particular, painstaking way, you can always ask for stories… perhaps you’ve caught one starting to sing but can’t yet place the melody.

Know that you may not get an answer.

Because the people who want to share their stories with you will — when you’re ready to actually listen… when they feel you see the whole of who they are, or perhaps they trust you to leave enough space for who they’re trying to be.

In my own experience, the latter can feel more important.