Black and White

"It's language is a language which the soul alone understands, but which the soul can never translate."

                   -Arnold Bennett

                                                                                                                                                                                          

I often find that my mind words in terms of black and white. Math comes the easiest; there's only one answer for anything. Writing is different because it's free, unpredictable. 

And like writing, life is unpredictable. 

When I was younger, moving was equivalent to the Armageddon. Living elsewhere than a place I'd known all my life could be nothing less than the end of the world. Just that black and white.

So you can imagine my surprise when the first streaks of gray appeared. Or maybe you can't. Such a moral is often insignificant when held up against the grand scheme of things. Regardless, it was a momentous occasion for me. New people and houses were accepted as friends and homes. I could consider a life other than the one I had known. Never before could things be anything less than pure ivory or ebony. 

Ironically enough, as soon as this gray scale of contemplation had shaded itself, I was to return to my hometown for good, resetting the world to its original 50's kitchen checkerboard tiles. It was hard; I had two homes now with a constant fear of losing touch with one. Perhaps due to my struggles not to lose it or merely the phenomenon that is maturing, my vision began to gray again.

Math is hard now, and writing feels more comfortable. Black and white each still claim their respective ends of the spectrum, but it's starting to bleed a little more and more in the middle as each day goes. 

Maybe one day it'll finally be silver. 

~E