I nearly just posted a letter to a friend, one of those, "I’d never send this" letters where I tell her exactly what I think.  Then I erased it because it’s inappropriate to post, but even more, I realized, why can’t I say these things to her?  I suppose sometimes a friend needs to ask our opinion before we give it.  I want to tell her that I think she’s running from her life, filling her time with busy work and plans, instead of creating a rich life for herself here.  I want to encourage her to go for more walks, to invest in herself not through dating, but in signing up for classes in things about which she’s always been secretly interested. Not some one off class either.  She needs routine and should stick with it. Scour the pages of Time Out or some other About Town section, then go to a museum or play or book reading.  I wish she’d slow down, sit with her silence, and realize no matter where she tries to go, that silence will still be there.  And it’s not about transforming emptiness into a quiet peace either.  It’s about sitting still and saying, this is actually how it should be.  Let me make the most of this.   

When she is here, she creates projects for herself, insisting she’s on a mission to find a lover.  Busy work because no job appeals to her unless it’s tied to fashion, and even then, she’d like nothing more than to quit any job, no matter how fabulous, to say she’s writing her book.  Why can’t she make herself happy where she is?  Read a book in central park, fix herself a picnic.  Instead it seems she is running from herself, thinking there’s some point in her future that will make her happier than she is now.  She doesn’t realize, even with all her talk, that she’s wearing Dorothy’s slippers, and the power is with her, and has always been within her, to change her life at home.