Skip to main content

No one asks if the steady ones are tired too

 

Lady Bird (2017)

Some people stay behind after the noise fades. When the lights go out and the world calms, they remain. Awake. Alert. Carrying things no one else sees. You don’t always notice them. They blend in. Steady. Composed. They hold others up, though no one holds them.


They move through life like shadows at twilight. Present, needed, but rarely seen for who they truly are. Their hands are always full, not with objects, but with moments they never asked for: calming a storm before it starts, bridging gaps no one else dares to cross, keeping peace in places where silence has long replaced warmth.


They speak little of what they carry. They’ve learned to mask their tired eyes with soft smiles, to turn sighs into silent strength. But behind their composure is a kind of ache—a longing to be cared for, not because they’re useful, but because they’re human.


No one teaches them how to rest. They read between lines others overlook, offer comfort without needing to be asked, and make sacrifices so seamlessly it seems like second nature. But their kindness is not effortless. It's exhausting.


And there are questions they ask themselves in the quiet. Am I strong, or simply numb? Do they love me, or just need me? Am I selfless, or just afraid of what will happen if I dare to be selfish? What would happen if I stopped trying?


There’s a cost to always being dependable. Over time, it chips away at the soul. Not in loud, obvious breaks, but in soft, slow unravelings. They forget what it’s like to be held without expectation, to be asked, “How are you?” and not rush to deflect.


Only near the end do you begin to see who this is about.


It’s the ones who learned too early how to take care of others. The ones who became protectors without being asked. The ones called eldest daughters.


To you: I see you. I know what you carry. You’ve been told your strength is in how much you can bear, how well you can keep going. But there is strength, too, in pausing. In saying, “I’m tired.” In letting someone else hold your heart for a while.


You are not here only to serve. You are not loved only for what you give. You deserve softness, care, and the kind of love that asks nothing in return. One day, let yourself unravel. Let yourself be comforted. Let yourself be you. Not the role, not the duty, just the person beneath it all.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The skin doesn't fit and never did

Hands by  He Lihuai It happened in the middle of something painfully ordinary—folding laundry. I was standing there, pairing socks, half-distracted like usual, when I suddenly just stopped. My eyes landed on my hands, hands I’ve seen a million times before and out of nowhere, this thought bloomed: these hands won’t always be mine. It shook me a little. Not in a dramatic, existential crisis kind of way. More like a wave lapping at the edges of my awareness. It was the kind of truth that doesn't shout. It hums. And it stayed with me. The older I get, the more moments like that seem to happen. Little flashes that remind me that our bodies aren’t really ours forever. We act like they are, like we can shape them, preserve them, make them last. But they’re not permanent. They're on loan. We’re visitors in our own skin, passing through. I’m reminded of this beautiful passage in Toni Morrison’s Beloved , when Baby Suggs, holy, stands before her community, not to preach doctrine, but t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Hope sounds like the first birdsong at dawn after a long night

  Taste of Cherry (1997) Hope isn’t always loud. It doesn’t always arrive with fireworks or sweeping declarations. More often, it lives quietly in the pause between falling apart and beginning again. It lingers in the small signs that life, somehow, goes on. Sometimes, it sounds like the first bird singing at the edge of morning after a sleepless night. A soft, steady reminder that darkness isn’t permanent. There’s a moment before sunrise when the world feels stuck, like the night might stretch on forever. The sky holds a deep blue stillness, and shadows spill into every corner. It’s easy then to believe that nothing will change. But then, from somewhere unseen, a single bird begins to sing. Not loudly, but with purpose. That melody doesn’t erase the night. It just offers something to hold on to. That’s what hope is. Small. Persistent. Real. It’s like that breath you take before doing something that scares you: that single moment where fear meets the chance to be brave. Hope doesn’...
Post a Comment
Read more

What the Stars Never Said

  Twilight by Sergey A. Tutunov I used to hate the stars. Every time I failed, I’d look up and talk to them as if they were listening. But they never answered. They just blinked, and I took that as their silent agreement that I was a failure, that I deserved everything going wrong. I tried learning their names. Orion, Cassiopeia, Andromeda, but I always got them wrong too. Eventually, I stopped looking. But one evening, as the sky shifted from dusk to dark, I found myself glancing up again. I didn’t name them this time. I just whispered a quiet plea, hoping maybe, just maybe, they’d say something different. "Tell me I deserve all of this," I whispered. The stars blinked, brighter this time and for a moment, I fixated on how much they shimmered, how often they pulsed. It was as if they were trying to say something, not mock me, but answer me. And then the wind moved. Soft, steady, and I paused. Had they always been this beautiful? Maybe I had been too consumed by my own failur...
Post a Comment
Read more