Something happened yesterday that I can’t really explain in my own mind. I met a woman I must have known in a different lifetime. She sat across from me dirty, disheveled and one week short of giving birth. In fact her due date is the day after Valentines. She was crass and vulgar and yet – to me – she was strangely beautiful and I had trouble not staring.
Bulbously pregnant, raven hair and olive skin. She had mannish arms and hands and dirt caked in every crack on her fingers. She talked to me with authority as though she presumed I would automatically do her bidding and she was entitled to service.
The thing is, I felt like I’ve known her before. And every time I tried to place it – I got imaginings from a time that is not this time. I tried to do my job while thinking in the back of my mind, “I must be going crazy because I could swear we went to war together. Fought together. Knew one another as friends in another era.”
Then I was back in my office. Data entry on my own computer. Obviously a modern age, with work to be done. She belched loudly and raised a hand, “Not the baby. That one was me.” Unapologetic. Without concern to whether she was offending. She went outside and had a cigarette despite being so close to birthing, and told me a joke that made my cheeks flame (and my cheeks rarely ever flame). She was a mess. And she was stunningly gorgeous to me. I cannot explain it.
It was one of the hardest appointments I’ve ever done and yet somehow, even knowing what her circumstances are, her health and wealth and life… she walked out and I knew she would be okay. Her baby would be okay. I was peaceful in the knowledge that she was being watched out for and as her back disappeared down the corridor I was hit with this sudden and unexplainable thought, “So this where she ended up. I always wondered if I’d see her again.”
Sometimes I feel like I’m losing my mind. These feelings, so content and matter of fact as though I actually wondered if I’d ever see her again make me feel like I must be nuts and just not know it yet. Or, if I give it just a moment in my consciousness and allow it – there is a space for just a heartbeat where letting myself feel that past life knowing makes everything else in my life make perfect sense. Then it is gone again and I’m back at my computer and the world is chaos and I am confused. To which I shrug and go get another cup of coffee.
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