top sheet january '24 (from the archives)

The tranquility of solitude & indispensable conversation

Today’s top sheet documents a conversation with a dear friend and neighbor. I recorded the talk in January of 2024, as I am beginning to dig into the archives of my voice notes to write up some older top sheets.

The two of us sit at a fairly noisy cafe, but quiet enough to hear one another clearly. She tells me that she does use a top sheet, and that really, it comes down to the principle of the matter. Although she sees how a top sheet could be suffocating (and feels that way herself sometimes), she likes to make her bed with a top sheet, and then ends up using it. The first word in her mind is elastic.

We grew up together in Sacramento, so I immediately want to ask her about the evolution of her relationship with the place itself. She has always had an affinity for Sacramento, and never felt like she wanted to escape. Moving away to Colorado for school only grew and deepened this love and admiration. All of her immediate and extended family live here, in Sacramento, and she has enjoyed being physically close to each of them. She also appreciates the diverse group of people within the city, and continues to find more beauty in the city each time she returns.

Her Sacramento and Colorado lives are “tragically different” as home is where she feels younger. A family to go to and hold on to, a younger mindset, natural relaxation. Colorado doesn’t have that, because she has created that home herself, and she relies solely on herself for learning about her surroundings and how she fits into that environment. Learning, in many forms, can become a job. Although elements of Colorado can be challenging for her, she still loves living there. She appreciates the easy accessibility to the outdoors, and has enjoyed immersing herself in a new space. However, she sees herself settling in Sacramento, and expresses gratitude for having a place she loves to come back to.

The two of us met in kindergarten, right after she had moved onto the street. I lived in her house for a few months while my house was getting remodeled right before she moved in, and I think it’s special that some of our earliest memories are in the same space. We even celebrated our high school graduation together in her front yard, with all of our friends and our families.

When she returns to childhood, she feels blessed to have gone through life without having to overcome anything giant– who she was around, and how she was raised, have only impacted her positively. It was fairly consistent in terms of the love and support she was surrounded by during her upbringing– the neighborhood, her church, her schools, her teams, were all communities overflowing with love. She also followed (and continues to follow) her parents’ examples of love. She discovered a love for building and creating that has stuck with her. She looks back on time with her dad building and fixing things fondly, and hopes she can incorporate more fixing and tinkering into her later years.

After choosing to go to Colorado for school, she often asked herself why she did it, crying saying goodbye to friends and family. But, she knew that she desired to place herself in the unfamiliar, wanting to be independent and alone and something. It wasn’t about the distance, but about exploring something new in herself.

Throughout our fifteen years of friendship, she has been one of the best listeners I know. She navigates conversations speaking insightfully and intelligently, and listening closely and openly.

“I love to listen to people because I love to feeling of being listened to. It completely changes your relationship with someone when you feel like you can be heard, on either side. I think that’s one of the greatest things you can give in life.”

She speaks to how much it means to her when she is heard fully, and how she tries to make everyone feel that way. She tells me she is fascinated by other people’s minds and new perspectives.

“Conversation is the most powerful thing in life! Nothing can heal or hurt you like a conversation can.”

She speaks to the importance of being alone, saying that the most formative times for her are when she reflects and processes on her own. We talk about how being alone has become such a scary idea in our generation, as we worry about what other people are thinking or how to navigate spaces on our own. She says that if everyone was forced to be alone a but more often, and had to be more conscious in doing so, people might be more confident in who they are. It is difficult to come into yourself without being completely inundated by other voices, and when you are trying to discover yourself and who you are, those other voices are very consequential. She has found that being alone is one of the most tranquil things. Learning how to make aloneness light rather than dark, and the importance in uncomfortability, being you in your own time and space.

Thank you for this wonderful conversation, my friend! I hope her words of wisdom inspire some moments of simple and restful aloneness today, and a reawakened gratitude for home. And thank you all for reading. I have a couple more conversations waiting in the archive, so I will see you soon. All my best…