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Mostly, it taught me how to let go.

I’m not a control freak – exactly. But I do like have everything under control, that being my weekly to-do list or what I’m feeling. My husband and my children are the only exceptions, and I’m not ashamed to be an emotional, weepy, soft fluffy thing when it comes to them. Me, the one who hardly shed a tear at all, cried over the phone with my son’s principal (it has to be said, though, that I called her a few days after Uvalde happened and I was an emotional train wreck. I called her to talk about the state of the school’s security, and I just lost it).

But for the rest?

My brain always reacts first – not my guts, not my heart. I’m a very cerebral person, everything and anything pass through deep analysis. Emotions will kick in. Later. Sometimes close by, sometimes weeks after the fact. I do understand it’s a coping mechanism and all that, but it’s still the way I am.

You’ll always have a reasoned reply from me. Which is why I stink at instant reactions. I need time to put it all in order in my head and formulate a plan before there’s action, and that’s not always an option. My husband is the guy who’ll react, usually perfectly. Then I come in and fix whatever with a lucid and precise plan, with many subplans for every possible outcome.

So, no, I’m not comfortable in the heart sphere.

You know what the first (dreaded) draft is?

Is letting go. Is losing yourself to feelings you experienced in order to write what other people are feeling. There’s little control, a lot of insight, too much self analysis.

And I’m NOT happy when I have to do that. Because keeping feelings on a leash is safer. Dealing with life’s tribulation solving them like an equation hurt less.

Again, nothing of it goes in the first draft and I bleed. Every time.

In a way, writing taught me how to bleed in a good, cathartic way.

It keeps me in touch with feelings and with the part of me I would keep controlled, and it made me a better person.