my name is...

the next chapter from "to be told" discusses truth that we will all be given a new name. it posed the following questions:

what inkling do you have of the name that will be given to you?
in your darkest hours, what name do you fear will be given?
what name do you hope for?

this is where it gets real. without going into details, this is what i came up with:
inkling: hope
fear: coward
hope: beloved

i read this chapter at the coffee shop. and i go to this particular coffee shop a lot. there's a barista there who keeps asking my name every time i order a drink from him. and today, when i told him again, he scolded himself for not remembering. "it's not like you don't come here every freaking day," he said. (i'm not really there every day, but at least once a week.) but anyway. he said he would make a point to remember it, especially now that he made such a big deal about it. then i realized that i have not once asked him his name. so, i did. sean. there's something powerful about having someone remember your name. funny that this conversation happened right before i read the same thing.

and then, when i first opened the chapter, i stumbled upon a little note from leslie, the friend who is lending me this book. i read it, found it encouraging, then moved on to the book. and then after reading the chapter and journaling on it for a while, i re-read that note. those names that i came up with? in the 2-3 sentence note, leslie spoke to each one of those names.

it was beautiful.