It is not much, I know, it doesn’t give much, I have no doubt. It is feeble and weak, lacking in depth and sustainability. It is lightweight and shifty, but it was all I had. It was just a straw, I kept telling myself, just a straw, nothing but a straw. But I miss it, I miss it so bad. Yes a straw it is, but it was mine, at least that is what I told myself and I had it.
It is gone now and there is a void the size of an aged oak tree. How can a straw leave such a void? How can a straw occupy so much space? A bigger space than some trees! Could it be that the straw was never a straw, but the space it displaces is actually the true indication of its size?
People come into our lifes and we judge them and size them up by whatever criteria we consider important, it could be longevity of the relationship, wealth, proximity, frequency of communication, status, age etc. Some we consider to be straw, others we consider to be trees and we never know whether we are wrong or right until they leave our life. Then we feel the emptiness that their departure creates and we gasp for the tree was never truly a tree, the departure hardly moved us or left an impact, but the supposedly straw shook our life. They are gone and we sat confused, disoriented, we are not ourselves, we don’t know what we are doing, for the roots of the straw reached deeper and further than the roots of the tree. The extraction of the straw caused unimaginable pain that was not felt when the tree moved on.
Treat all people well, for you don’t always know the true impact of people until they are no longer with us.
Beautiful Ivory 