over. The man hadn’t asked me for anything, other than to stay safe. I had spent that whole trip to New York on Defcon 5, keys clenched between my knuckles, back against the wall, overly paranoid, and that all melted away, with one kiss on my hand.
Maybe it was a fragment of my grandmother’s energy, or maybe that man could see angels and demons, or maybe it was all bullshit. But it wasn’t bullshit to me.
My experience with that man made me feel calm, and my anxiety hasn’t returned since. As someone who doesn’t dabble too much in the supernatural, I do respect energy and vibes, and that man, with his nineties throwback outfit and heavy Harlem slang, had some of the purest, most authentic energy I’ve ever experienced from a stranger.
I believe his purpose wasn’t to make me feel calm, but rather to show me that I had healed from the past trauma of the robbery and could now push my limits a little bit more and open myself up to others once again. I’d chosen to ask him a question, which was a step—putting myself out there—that I’d held off on taking for months.
I didn’t walk away from that experience thinking I had to protect myself as some prophetic being. Instead, I walked away pleasantly surprised, and proud that I’d regained a sense of my old self, the guy who wanted to continue exploring the universe through everyone he met. Getting beat up and robbed had temporarily suspended those adventures, but after a few years, I was ready to open myself back up to the world.
My real guardian angel in this story was time. We never fully get over traumas, and as much as we heal, scars will remain. That doesn’t mean we need to view those scars as reminders of our injuries; instead, we can see them as proof of our resilience.
We don’t have to trust others when they come into our worlds; we just have to trust ourselves to handle whatever happens. I’ve been cheated by people I loved, scammed by those I considered family, and beaten up and robbed by kids. But I don’t want to lose the opportunity for magic moments of connection to occur, and that means I must be open and welcoming to them. Beautiful winds won’t take us anywhere if we don’t have our sails open.
Time was the friend that helped me heal, slowly but surely, and time showed me I could get back to who I was and that I didn’t need to define myself through my past traumas. All I needed to do was be patient and know that my choices in the meantime could make things better or worse.
I could have told that gentleman to fuck off, gotten up and changed seats, or even passively kept my earbuds in, pretending not to hear him. Looking back, I’m glad I didn’t. Sometimes when we’re injured, we have to lean in to the pain a bit to get stronger.
I believe that even when we are in moments of misery and self-pity, the universe will offer us totems—lessons that pull us out of our selfish orbits and help us see the bigger picture. The most recent totem gifted to me was a puddle. The puddle found me as I worked on a very ambitious six-month music video for a track I recorded titled I Will.
The video features multiple tableaus, each telling a different story. It was inspired by the visual images of gangs in the 1979 film The Warriors, but I threw a little twist on it, with one gang being represented by the toughest group of people I know: cancer thrivers. I use the word thrivers instead of survivors because the women I worked with are doing much more than just surviving. They are fighting a daily battle against a horrific disease, but also confronting the reality that many of us work so hard to avoid: the fact that time is running out. We put out a call and found four strong women who were willing to show their battle scars on camera. While we were setting up, I spoke with them all, and my curiosity trumped my discretion and tact.
“How does life feel different now?” I asked, unsure whether I was being too forward or insensitive.
“Well, cancer taught me how to fall in love with puddles,” replied a woman named Anne Marie. “I never noticed puddles before my diagnosis. I was too busy worrying about all the other useless shit life throws at us. The moment I found out it all might go away, I started noticing beauty in the simplest things, like the reflections in a puddle.”
Anne Marie’s cancer took a lot from her, but she had an amazing partner who was by her side during recovery and at the shoot; their love inspired me beyond words. It was almost as if the cancer had done some reorganizing with her life, leaving only what really mattered, with room to notice all the beauty that was hidden before.
The type of beauty found only in puddles.
We all experience loss and tragic news. Many of us are fortunate that those situations aren’t as intense as cancer, but it’s not about comparing our suffering; it’s about the perspectives we have when that suffering hits us. When everything is going well and according to plan, we often sleepwalk through life, focused on our repetitious days of routine and boredom. When something unexpected strikes, we’re suddenly jolted out of our comfort zone, often ill prepared, unsure of what just happened, heart racing a mile a minute.
Facing death is a great alarm clock. Being aware of our mortality, even when things are going well, is a great way to avoid pressing the snooze button.
I had spent that day running around like a chicken without a head, and Anne Marie’s words stopped me in my tracks. We stress about things because we think they’re important, but are they really that important when it’s all said and done? I had so much going on that it was impossible for me to see any light at the end of the tunnel; I was caving myself in. I started taking an inventory of all the things I was spending my time, energy, and focus on, and I asked myself, “Would this be worth it if today were the last day of my life?” Then I went even deeper and asked, “Is this a better use of my time than enjoying a sun-kissed sky or beautiful puddle?”
I stacked my life up with useless shit only because I forgot I wouldn’t be here forever. The important stuff was supposed to happen “after”—but after what? There is no better time to enjoy life than the present, because that present is all we have. We create imaginary timelines and assume we’ll still be here to see everything play out. Anne Marie’s words inspired me to reevaluate my timelines and priorities. I acknowledged that if something wasn’t bringing me joy, then it needed to take a back seat in my life.
People with serious health conditions, like cancer, have to shorten their timelines for the things they want in life. Goals can no longer be left to “someday,” because that day may never come. But this rule applies to us all; even eighty years is a short period of time in the grand scheme of things.
For people like Anne Marie, cancer lights a fire under them to value their time and spend whatever amount they have left on their own terms. It gifts them a perspective we all could benefit from: to focus only on the things that really matter to us and to abandon playing it safe. The sky is always painted beautifully before the sun sets, but we rarely make time to enjoy it, unless we plan an elaborate vacation to a sandy destination, pretending that the sun is somehow different there, more deserving of our attention.
Things aren’t black or white, good or bad, positive or negative—a lot of space exists in between, and when it comes to birth and death, our existence is that in-between space. While we’re
