I believe in energy. I’m not sure how it works, but I believe it exists.
Last week, I was out for a walk with Gemma. It’s my favourite thing to do in the mornings. We’ll go for 2-3 hours, grabbing a coffee along the way and walking walking walking. Sometimes I’ll listen to an audio book, sometimes without anything at all, just the two of us.
This particular time, I was finishing an audiobook called Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg. It’s become one of my favourite books, with stories and lessons about how the right conversations can help us connect with anyone.
He was talking about the kinds of questions we can use in conversations, whether with strangers or friends, to help us feel closer to each other. To go beyond small talk and feel like you shared something meaningful.
As I was listening, I turned up a street we don’t normally walk on.
There was a large park on one side and a row of houses on the other, each one a different shape and size and colour. I liked how unique they were.
I was passing by one, admiring how the brick was painted light blue, the door a pale shade of pink, when a woman came out of it. She was holding a cup of coffee, her hair mostly greyish-blond, dressed in her house clothes, and she came to sit on the stairs.
I thought of the book I was listening to, and how good questions can help us connect with anyone. So instead of continuing to walk by, I did a little U turn.
“Your house is beautiful,” I said to the woman, “Did you paint it?”
“It’s actually my friend’s house,” she said. “But I did choose the colours. I painted it for my daughter, Grace. She passed away. The light pink was her favourite. The bench across the street is in her memory too.”
She went on to tell me about how the kitchen inside used to be oxblood red, how it reminded her of the tv show Dexter, and how she just had to repaint it so it didn’t feel so suffocating. She told me that her other daughter was coming home from university later that day and how excited she was to see her. She was getting sandwiches ready to greet her with, so her daughter could eat before running off to the Olivia Rodrigo concert that night.
We talked about our summer plans, the countries we’d traveled to, and how when they were younger and both daughters still alive, she’d taken them out of school to travel around Europe for a while.
She told me how the neighbourhood had changed over the last 30 years, how she used to own a bistro down the street with her now ex-husband. She introduced herself, and said I should stop by any time.
We talked for 30 minutes before she had to go and get ready for her daughter to arrive. I went home, happy to have met someone new and to have shared a real connection.
*
I passed by her house again today. It was cold, and I wasn’t expecting to see her. I was feeling a little sad and on edge, although the coffee was helping, and so was playing the same 3 songs over and over again for the past two hours, always in the same order, again and again:
I remembered the woman talking about the bench she’d put up to commemorate her daughter, and crossed the street to see it. It was covered with flowers, and on the front there was a plaque.
“Sit and smile in memory of Gracie who grew up playing in this park, who was taken too soon, and whose legacy is eternal.”
I couldn’t imagine what living with that loss must feel like. It was a stranger I’d met only briefly but our conversation had meant something to me, and I felt for her.
I went to put my hand on the bench, wanting to pass a piece of energy to Grace or to her mom, I wasn’t even sure who. Just to say, you haven’t been forgotten. You’re remembered, you were loved, your mom cares about you so much, and your memory lives with a stranger. And to her mom - what a heavy loss, how much you must have loved her, I can see that, and I hope your life is gentle and good.
That’s what I wanted to pass on, in whatever mystical way energy works.
Instead, when my hand touched the bench, something came back to me.
Instead of giving, it felt like receiving. I felt a sudden calm, an incredible steadiness in my chest where I’d felt sadness and heaviness and my own knotted stuff. Tears immediately came to my eyes and I stepped back, taking my hand off the bench.
The feeling faded.
I’m just in a mood and imagining things, I thought to myself.
I put my hand on the bench again.
The feeling came back. A deep calm, a deep settling.
I don’t know how energy works, but in my world it does. It can pass between people and objects and back again. You can store luck in a rabbit’s foot, find focus in the smell of a burning candle, or feel the love of a lost daughter living in a bench.
Thank you Gracie.
✨
Warmly yours,
Nina
P.S. If you prefer listening to reading, I did an IG reel of my last newsletter here!
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Lovely post. Sending some positive energy for you!