I suspect you would not be surprised that I have been known to talk a lot. But despite using an awful lot of them, I truly respect words and think that they matter.
But in reality we all say things that we just … say. The words don’t seem particularly important at the time. I have a constant quip, for example, that part of the reason I live in Manhattan is because I can go to McDonald’s in a ball gown — yes, I have a longstanding attachment to the beauty of dresses in all their many forms. I never expected that silly line to actually be a lifeline.
It’s exactly what I said (more or less) to my photographer friend at the end of a shoot where I ended up in a gown. She assumed I wanted to change before leaving the studio. I pointed out that I had no intention of changing and maybe I would just stop by a McDonald’s on my way out. “It’s Manhattan,” I said. “I could be on the way to the theatre and decided I wanted a cheeseburger.” She laughed. We didn’t discuss it again.
Apparently my words had struck my friend at the time and she kept them with her over the years.
Tough years, as it turns out. In the time since we last spoke, she got a divorce and her mother died. Life hasn’t been easy. It’s been really, really impossibly hard actually.
So she put on a favourite silk gown — it was green — and went to McDonald’s. She was alone and she was brave and she was beautiful. For a moment, she tells me, it helped.
I don’t know what the lesson to this story is, or even if there is one at all. Perhaps it is just this: we all touch each other in some way, we make a difference in each other’s lives. Sometimes words matter even when they don’t.