This Is How It Always Is

by Laurie Frankel

Just being yourself never worked, but if you made yourself up, you got to be exactly who you knew yourself to be.

“All life. You are never finish, never done. Never become, always becoming. You know? Life is change so is always okay you are not there yet. Is like this for you and Poppy and everyone. The people who do not understand are change. The people who afraid are change. There is no before and no after because change is what is life. You live in change, in in between.”

Dispelling fear. Taming what was scary not by hiding it, not by blocking it or burying it, not by keeping it secret, but by reminding themselves, and everyone else, to choose love, choose openness, to think and be calm. That there were more ways than just two, wider possibilities than hidden or betrayed, stalled or brokenhearted, male or female, right or wrong. Middle ways. Ways beyond.

“So how do I do it then? How do I share my secret? What do I tell?” “Your story.” The witch didn’t even hesitate. “You tell your story. That is what we all must do.” “That’s not magic,” said Grumwald. “Of course it is,” said the witch. “Story is the best magic there is.”