Olivia Strauss Is Running Out of Time

by Angela Brown

These are the days that must happen to you . . . —Walt Whitman, “Song of the Open Road”

every woman’s dying wish was to simply spend her final days—however many of them she had left—being able to exist in the simple quietness of her life. To have more time to enjoy and appreciate the beauty in that.

Life is so strange. At times, it feels so lonely, like we’re isolated with our flaws and fears.

But in the end, you begin to learn that, despite our many differences, we’re all

the same.

we aren’t born with one life, but with two. The life we live before we understand loss, and the one we finally live once we realize that, despite our many efforts, our life will ultimately end.

Sometimes, you just have to sit quietly with your grief and give it room to breathe. You have to acknowledge that it is a part of you, and that it probably always will be.

There is no such thing as a perfect life. There are only perfect moments.

The life I’d wanted had always been there. It was only a matter of me finally learning to open my eyes so I could see it.

The funny thing about writing is that, to some degree, it is always rooted in our pain.