A wave retreats—
Not to abandon the shore,
But to remind it what absence feels like.
The Message I Never Sent
It was a Thursday. A forgettable kind of day. The kind of day that drifts by unnoticed, blending into the ones before it.
I had a thought—just a small one, barely there. I should check in. It’s been a while.
I typed out a message. Simple, nothing grand. Hey, been thinking about you. Hope you’re doing okay.
I stared at it for a moment, then set my phone down. I’ll send it later, I told myself. Tomorrow, maybe.
Tomorrow never came.
Instead, there was a different message. One I wasn’t prepared for. One that didn’t ask permission before changing everything.
And just like that, the moment I had been waiting for—the perfect time—was gone.
The Conversations We Assume We’ll Have
We always think there’s more time. We live as if life stretches endlessly ahead, as if the people we love will always be there, waiting for us to find the right words.
But life does not move in straight lines. It moves in sudden turns, in sharp edges, in moments that shift from ordinary to irreversible in the space of a breath.
And then we are left with the echoes of what we didn’t say.
- The apology we meant to give but never did.
- The “I miss you” we assumed they already knew.
- The invitation we kept postponing until it was too late.
There is no such thing as the right time. There is only now.
Wabi-Sabi and the Beauty of Imperfect Endings
Wabi-sabi tells us that nothing is permanent. That what makes life beautiful is precisely the fact that it cannot be held forever.
A leaf does not fall from a tree at the wrong time. It falls when it is meant to.
A candle does not burn too quickly. It simply burns as long as it can.
A goodbye, spoken or unspoken, is still a goodbye.
We do not get to decide how long we have with someone. But we do get to decide how present we are while they’re here.
Lessons From a Message That Was Never Sent
- Say it now. “I love you.” “I miss you.” “I’m sorry.” There is no better time.
- Stop waiting for perfect moments. They don’t exist.
- Reach out, even if it’s been too long. Even if you don’t know what to say.
- The small things you hold onto—grudges, hesitations—will never matter as much as you think.
- The people you love deserve to know they are loved.
The Silence That Taught Me Everything
That night, I sat with my phone in my hand, rereading the message I never sent.
The words were still there. But the person I had meant to send them to was not.
I closed my eyes, exhaled, and typed another message.
This time, I hit send.
Because some words should never be left unsaid.
life 
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