Only the Beautiful

by Susan Meissner

I’ll be rooming with other fallen girls who have gotten themselves in trouble, and we will surely be reminded daily of our failure to make good choices. Why aren’t there places like that for fallen men, I wonder, where they are tsked and told every day that their recklessness has led to disaster?

P.S. to Rosie: I hope you are enjoying the little bit of paradise I had sent to you. I’ve always loved an amaryllis at Christmastime. It blooms in winter because it believes it is spring. After the first of the year, pull the bulb from the dirt. Keep it cool and dry, like in the barn or barrel room. Next year, if you repot it in November, it will bloom for you again at the holidays. Just like it is blooming now. An amaryllis is always waiting to delight and surprise you, even when your world seems cold and dark.

Who defines what is weakness? I’d wondered. Isn’t it only the strong who get to decide that? Isn’t it only the strong who have the power to act on what they decide? How can that be right or fair or good?

A book is always in many places at once. That is its singular wonder. A book takes one voice speaking and makes it many. A book can shine far brighter and longer than I ever could on my own.

How we treat one another is what we are still able to do something about.

With giving, there is cost, isn’t there? There is always cost. Sometimes it is an easy sum to hand over.