There are parts of ourselves we show the world.
And then there are the other parts.
The thoughts we stop before they reach our mouths. The questions we learned not to ask. The desires we keep private. The anger we swallow because we’re supposed to be over it by now. The doubts that don’t fit neatly beside what we say we believe.
The things we think about when nobody else is around.
That’s where this comes from.
I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to find the light.
I’ve written about hope. I’ve believed in second chances. I’ve looked for meaning in painful things and tried to convince myself that somehow, eventually, everything finds its way toward something better.
I still believe some of that.
But I’ve also learned that not everything gets better just because we want it to.
Some wounds don’t completely heal.
Some questions never get answered.
Some people leave holes nobody else fills.
Some desires don’t disappear simply because we’d rather not have them.
And sometimes the person everyone thinks is doing fine is quietly trying to figure out how to make it through another night alone with their own thoughts.
We don’t talk about that part very much.
Maybe because we’re afraid of making other people uncomfortable.
Maybe because we’re afraid of what they’ll think of us.
Or maybe we’ve spent so many years presenting the acceptable version of ourselves that we’re no longer entirely sure where that person ends and the real one begins.
I know something about that.
So I created this place.
Not because I’ve found my way out of the shadows.
Because sometimes I still live here.
There will be things written here that are uncomfortable. Things about loneliness and love. Faith and doubt. Sex and desire. Grief. Anger. Regret. Getting older. Wanting things we can’t have. Missing people we shouldn’t miss. And probably a few things I haven’t admitted to myself yet.
I don’t know exactly where any of it will lead.
For once, I don’t want to know.
I want somewhere I can write the sentence instead of deleting it.
Somewhere a story doesn’t have to end with a lesson.
Somewhere darkness isn’t treated like a problem that needs to be solved before we’re allowed to talk about it.
There will be hope here. I can’t seem to completely get rid of it.
But I won’t manufacture it.
If the light comes, we’ll let it come.
And if tonight it doesn’t, maybe we can just sit here together for a while.
You don’t have to explain why you’re here.
Neither do I.
Welcome to Inside the Shadows.
— Rowan Vale