Ann came into my office after bed asking if we could talk. “Of course,” I said. She couldn’t sleep and just wanted to talk to me about what she was thinking about and how she was feeling.
We’ve had these sorts of chats before, but this time it was somehow different. I’m not sure how to describe it other than the tone was more mature. Sure, we got off on tangents like why we use the phrase “the best thing since sliced bread”, but there were a lot of other connection points.
At one point, I caught myself saying something like, “things will get better”, and then snorted and said that was a silly thing to say and that she probably heard that all the time. She laughed and agreed.
I see her growing up and becoming her own person, but we have things in common and that won’t change. If anything the commonalities will increase—not that she’ll live a similar life to mine, but various life experiences are bound to overlap at some level.