Almost Sad

A place I used to call home. Plus-- my children's inheritance.

Apr 04, 2025

TLDR: My pain used to fit like a worn-in pair of shoes—now I’ve outgrown it, and I’m rocking the barefoot life.

Almost sad.
A place I used to call home.

I don’t know if I was a girl with imaginary friends (Mom?). I did have some real ones and I also had an imagination, so the ingredients were there. I do remember, though, a long-time companion with whom I’m still friends today.

My pain.

(If you are Emma’s mom, please consider leaving a comment to let the world know whether or not Emma had imaginary friends. Thankuloveuseeusoonkbye)

Growing Pains

I’ve outgrown my pain.
Not demised
Or despised
But alchemized
To fertilize
It used to sit at the pit of my pursuits
Now it rests at my roots as I upshoot and bear fruit.

So sweet.

Take off your soul’s shoes,
And let me rub your feet.

My pain has always been there—sometimes beneath, sometimes burying, sometimes buttressing my joy.

Over the winter, this pain seared as part of me died—violently, dramatically. For months, that sensation hijacked my consciousness. I felt, physically, like I was dying. And the pain of it made death feel desirable.

Sweet relief.

Thanks to my ride-and-NOT-die homies/family, I made it to February. At this point, the tightness of pain gave way to the expanse of pleasure, and it is in this expanse that I’ve been living, god bless, for two months.

And I’m not leasing this new lease on life—I paid for it in cold hard cash, my name is on the deed, and I plan on this newfound joy being my children’s inheritance.

And still—

Do you ever wake up and feel… almost sad?

It happens to me now and then—sometimes more than I’d like. I wake up without my usual spark. I can still see the beauty in the world, but I can’t feel it, so the whole day hums with a dull ache. I’m not quite sad—not yet. There’s no trigger, no clear reason. But sadness hovers, whispering somberly and seductively nearby.

It would be enough to simply feel that. But my overachieving brain goes looking for evidence. If I’m not 100% myself, I start hunting for a reason—scavenging my circumstances for something to blame. And when I find it (real or imagined), I scold myself for getting into this state. Suddenly sadness has a reason to be here. It takes the stage. And I go from “almost sad” to just sad, with a sprinkle of shame for not showing up as my high-energy, high-love, high-presence self.

God, it’s exhausting.

I hadn’t felt that way in a while. I’ve been buoyed by the dailiness of joy—people I love, things that give me purpose.

Until Tuesday. (Why is it always a Tuesday?)

Almost-sadness greeted me in the morning. From the outside, it looked like this:

Slowness: the drapes stayed closed longer.
Indecisiveness: I changed my outfit three times.
Absentmindedness: spilled coffee grounds, misplaced items, compulsively refreshed my email.
Looping: my morning journaling was practical and cyclical, not poetic or lyrical.
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Have you ever felt almost-sad? How does it show up for you? How do you deal with it? Comment and let me know!

Photo courtesy of Greg Shea

Now that I’m writing this, I realize: the difference between waking up almost-sad or not often comes down to where I wake up—my head or my body.

If I’m in my head, I’m prone to spiraling. If I’m in my body, I can feel the blessing of breath, of blood, of skin. I can feel here.

That Tuesday, I stayed mostly alone all day. It wasn’t until the evening, when my dear friend Noah called, that I spoke aloud. He asked how I was doing. I said, “Almost sad.”

And in that moment, something shifted. I noticed how familiar that phrase felt. Familiar. Family-ar. Like family.

And I also noticed that my relationship to it had changed.

I didn’t try to fix it. I just let it be. I stayed with it, tenderly, knowing that if I honored it, tomorrow might be different.

And it was.

(Note: this strategy is contingent upon wanting a tomorrow. Earlier this year, I wasn’t convinced. Now, yes please and again and again and again a million times over.)

I was still almost-sad Wednesday, but less so. Then even less so Thursday.

But what struck me most was how at home I felt in my almost-sadness and full out sadness. Like slipping on an old pair of shoes.

Which brings me to something I’ve been exploring lately in poems, performances, and ponderings:

Just because something is comfortable doesn’t mean it’s good for you.

Many of us—myself included—acclimate to discomfort, to dysfunction, to pain. We learn to navigate life through it, so much so that we begin to recreate it, even when it’s no longer necessary.

But, as I said, I’m trying to build a different kind of inheritance for my children and their children and so on: an inheritance of joy. So I have to think about interest—and not just emotional, but generational. What’s in our best interest? What will give us the best return on this investment of a life?

I want to pay my life forward.

My pain holds impressions molded perfectly to my body— my former body. I’m growing, and it no longer fits.

So I’m upgrading my wardrobe.

I’m making all this interest on my investment in joy that I COULD afford a new pair of shoes entirely, but I think I’m gonna rock the bare-feet for a little.

My feet have callouses that I worked hard for. They’re strong. Grounded. And cute.
Wiggly.

I won’t throw away my pair of pain. Perhaps I’ll put them on a shelf in my soul (sole?) or carry them around with me as a good luck charm.

Or at least a reminder of how much I’ve grown.

Almost sad used to be my home. Now it’s just a guest who knows to take off its shoes.

Me bearing so much fruit and tossing them rinds. Courtesy of Devin Armstrong

Have you outgrown your pain? Where do you call home? Do you have a bone to pick with me about mixing the shoe metaphor with investment opportunities? Please, by all means, let a girl know! I love to hear your musings in any form!

Emuse

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