The Book of Beginnings

by Sally Page

Sometimes a heartbeat is all the time it takes to reach a decision.

It also occurs to her that when you feel most in need of new friends, is often the time when you feel least capable of making them.

Yes, it's a fact!!!

I have known the silence of the stars, and of the sea. And the silence of the city when it pauses.

‘When your right hand gives, even your left hand shouldn’t know what the right hand is doing.’ ‘Who said that?’ ‘Jesus,’ Ruth says,

I have often thought we spend too much time obsessing about finding, “the one”, and we forget that a best friend can be a lifelong love. There is a fundamental truth, comfort and joy in having a best friend.’ Ruth smiles, a little mistily. ‘I think of it sometimes; all over the earth there are these unacknowledged love stories, making the world a better place. I personally think it is one of humanity’s best-kept secrets.’

What a wonderful thought!!

‘George Eliot once wrote these words: “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”’

‘Sometimes we try to hold on to friendships when really they were there for that particular part of our lives.’

True as well..... though you can be guilty of moving on too readily!!!

‘I have come to think of it as being on a stage. Sometimes other people are on that stage with you, and sometimes they leave. And like in a play, I suppose, that feels right. They were there for that act or scene in your life. Trying to pull them back on stage would be wrong.’ She looks at Jo. ‘Better to let them go and recall the joy of being on the stage with them for that glorious scene.’

Another thought about friends here.

‘A place for everything and everything in its place,’

‘I keep thinking of a poem. It’s my dad’s favourite. I can’t remember who wrote it but there’s a line in it: Time was away and somewhere else. I feel like everything has been on hold. But now I don’t think I know how to restart my life.’ ‘Louis MacNeice.’ Malcolm nods. ‘You know it?’ ‘Yes, indeed. “Meeting Point”.’

One to look up!!

It is simply a quote from George Eliot’s book, Middlemarch: For the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.