One More Light

Watching my mother at the door of my house was disorienting. Above me on the second floor I could hear my children moving, playing, laughing. 

My mother and I stared at each other, and a familiar adrenaline thinning of my blood told me I was scared, nervous, childish. 

It never failed, her withering look could turn me into an infant, and even as I steeled myself to do what I knew I had to, the little girl inside me winced. 

Holding on, 
Why is everything so heavy? 

“I think it’s probably time we called it quits.” 
The irony of my conversation was not eluding me. I had never had a break up in my life, and here I was breaking up with my mother. The first connection of my life. The one connection that should have outlasted at least one of our lives.

I keep dragging around what’s bringing me down
If I just let go I’d be set free

Her eyes were tear filled, as they always were when I refused to concede a point she was determined to hold on to. It wasn’t her fault though. more than two decades of me letting her win arguments was a habit we were both struggling to break. 

I was learning faster than her. 

The way the rest of the year followed was bad. I struggled to eat, then I gained weight, then I lost it. I went from wanting to reach out to my offended parents to steeling myself that I never would again. 

Sometimes, things are heavy. Sometimes, it takes months to wrestle demons who refuse to go down. 

I found out about One More Light on a bad night, where I was contemplating the vast void that was my side of the family. 

In anticipation, I began to listen to every Linkin Park album, from Hybrid Theory straight through. 

I listened to Heavy. I listened to Battle Symphony. I anxiously awaited the rest. 
The remixes of past albums lulled me to sleep, they serenaded my boring happy life, my inner struggling daughter guilt. 

I know all the words now, from Nobody Can Save me, to Sharp Edges. 

Is this album different? 
Yes. 

But I am also different. 

Linkin Park was my first taste of poetry, and a bit of me studies the lyrics of this new album with curious, puzzled eyes. 

I am used to describing Linkin Park with words like ardent, passionate, raw, furious, truthful, honest. 

Maybe some of those words are not the ones I would use now, but I sure hope that I am also not described with the same handful of words as that little ten year old who began listening to Hybrid Theory. 

I will find new words to describe them, because I will have plenty of time as I plan to listen to them always. 

One day, I’ll get to go to one of their concerts. So help me. 

One More Light has played my children to sleep on long car rides home from crazy fun days. It’s already lulled me to sleep on a tearfilled night. I’ve already daydreamed new stories and books to it’s rhythms and beats. 

Like all the rest, it is a patch in the fabric of my life. 

And for that I am grateful. 

Much love to the band who affected my life without even knowing it.