A few weeks ago, I made a commitment to myself to take time to write every day. If I want to be able to call myself a writer, in any sense of the word, that desire necessitates… writing.
I knew when I made that commitment that there would be days when finding words to put on my electronic page would be difficult. Sometimes, we all face days when there is just nothing much to say.
Today is one of those days for me. But not for the regular reasons.
What is there to say?
What am I to say on a day when the sun is shining, I’m looking out on a beautiful landscape from a home that provides me everything in life that I need? The skies around me are clear, blue; the lake is still, peaceful. I am comfortable and content. At this same exact moment, mothers and children are fleeing their homes, dodging bombs and enemy gunfire. They are leaving their husbands and fathers and sons to fight a war they never signed up for. There is nothing to say.
We are barely two months into a year that has already delivered a continued global pandemic and a convoy of trucks, protesters and militants taking Canadian cities hostage, complaining about our freedoms. All this while tensions were escalating in eastern Europe and the threat of war came closer and closer to Ukraine’s doorstep. Yet from bouncy castles and hot tubs, people here were complaining about our freedoms. There are no words.
Nothing to say
Someone wrote on Twitter that the difference between me (or you or anyone else) and a refugee is luck. That’s it. And they were exactly right. By some wild twist of fate, I sit here at my computer knowing that the worst part of my day is probably going to be begrudgingly doing a load of laundry. What privilege. I have done absolutely nothing more to deserve my lifestyle than the men, women and children in Ukraine have done to deserve what they are going through.
There is truly nothing to say.
John and I have made our donations to charities supporting the people of Ukraine, we are staying up to date on events there. We will continue to put pressure on our political leaders to do the right thing if we feel they are being lax or unresponsive. But it feels I owe the universe an apology for the inequity in the distribution of privilege and pain on this earth. There are no words; there is nothing to say.
I will continue on with my day; my heart will be heavy.
One response to “Nothing to Say”
[…] to myself that I would write daily, knowing that some days would be harder than others. I’ve written about that before too and today is one of those […]