Remember when we were younger? Our parents used to buy us a toy and say "Keep it in the box, in pristine condition, that will be worth something someday." And so we do, and we wait and wait, and we give up moments in our life to hope that someday, that little toy bobble head is worth enough to keep us comfortable.
I feel like that's a little bit like my life has been. I grew up in this Snowglobe of comfort, where everything is made to seem like I am living in a box of pleasantries and I am staring out into this big world of opportunity with anticipation. My parents did a really good job of keeping me in that box for a while, I was a timesake, a collectible to society.
There was this reflection of myself staring back at me in the
cheap plastic that guarded me from the world that was telling me.
Stay in there - it's not so great out here, Stay in there and you'll be worth something someday.
I think sometimes we are taught that we will only be worth something if we stay tucked away, in a chest of memories that become forgotten over the years, but where we wait to be worth something. In a box keeping us clean and pristine from the dust that only collects around our box rather than being like the pain that collects in our hearts.
We are taught that the scratches of time from hate and misunderstanding will create an image of insignificance. We are played with, as all toys are. We are passed around and spoken about. We are dropped and lost. We are taught that dust only settles for brief moments in time but eventually you slowly make your way to the back of the shelf, a cycle of forgotten importance that creates voids of worth.
I have, from time to time, missed my box. I've missed that smell of familiarity combined with that embrace of certainty. I miss looking at the world through rose colored glasses and feeling like I will be safely tucked away, not forgotten but protected, from the cruel world we live in. And even in times of clarity where I know that the scratches and scuff marks and constant flurry of dust mean that I have lived, there will always be that small voice in the back of my mind, bringing me back to a place of love where my own reflection told me:
Stay in there- It's not so great out here
Stay in there and you'll be worth something someday.
Stay in there and you'll be worth something someday.
