I honestly just want to go to sleep.

I’m tired, I had drinks with a friend and some fries, I have a full week ahead- but this morning I had a thought about story. And I feel like I need to flesh it out a bit, so here I am, in my comfy with a Yule log playing on the tv, my Christmas lights on and we’re gonna talk about it.

I just finished a book in a supernatural series I’m reading and with each book I’m shocked to see that this author has more story to tell and more places to go and more character development.

I’m a sucker for a supernatural story. I think it’s the BA in English in me that loves stories that aren’t cut and dry where I have to search out the themes and character archetypes and strings that weave through a story. I love the moment where I realize that something I read ten pages ago was actually the foreshadowing I thought it was.

And I love when an author uses all of those elements; archetypes, themes, context clues and story crafting to take a hard left when you think they were going to go right.

[For example: Gargoyles. (The girls that get it; get it)]

When they craft a story that feels like it always was only to open the world in the story to things you never thought possible.

And as you read on you realize it all makes sense. All the things that have lead to that moment make sense. You just couldn’t read it in the way the author meant because to you that’s what they had always done.

I’m really bad at believing that life is just going to be the same again.

That the situation is the same, the scenarios are the same, the feelings are the same.

That nothing lifted to make the story different.

But today, sitting in church during worship I got a fierce reminder that if the story was the same I’d just be rereading a chapter.

And I’m not.

Going into a new year can feel like a lot of things. And no, the world doesn’t change when the clock strikes midnight. But it becomes fresh.

You can create hope and life and walk into something choosing to believe that the story is going to turn left rather than right.

You can believe you aren’t rereading-it’s a new chapter.

(Like maybe there might suddenly be gargoyles).

I can admit freely that especially in the last year of my life I’ve lived in fear of the other shoe dropping. That I’m gonna get on a plane and the world will crash down again, that a phone call will crumble me.

I’ve treated each season like I was rereading a chapter rather than writing a new story.

I haven’t stepped out of the box enough to see that the themes and context clues and foreshadowing mean something wholly different than before.

And that is honestly terrifying to admit.

There are a few weeks left of 2022. I know there isn’t a magic spell, or some potion or anything that will change it all.

But, I do know that I have to stop living as if I’m rereading a chapter.

And honestly I don’t know what that means.

But, I do know that this isn’t just a me thing.

You also aren’t rereading a chapter.

You don’t have to live in the monotony of what always was.

And you, human reading this, have so much to contribute to the narrative.

So, with that, I’m going to shower.

With absolute love,

Meg