One Life One Encounter

There’s something strange about being included and still feeling slightly outside of it.

Not excluded.
Not unwelcome.
Just… not fully inside.

We woke up before sunrise to jump in a tuk-tuk and head to the trailhead that would lead us up Rostro Maya- where we would be rewarded with an incredible sunrise over Lago Atitlan.

It’s the kind of plan that sounds great the night before—somewhere between optimistic and slightly unhinged—and a little less appealing when your alarm goes off in the dark.

It was harder than I expected.
Steeper. Longer. The kind of hike where you question your life choices at least once on the way up.

But also the kind that makes it worth it when you get to the top.

We sat and watched the sun come up over the lake, everything quiet in that early morning way that feels almost suspended.

A few days before that, we had all taken the lancha over to San Pedro to experience the processions of Semana Santa, which culminate on Semana viernes-also known as Good Friday.

I don’t follow any particular religion, but there was something about it that was hard not to feel.

The devotion.
The detail.
The way the alfombras were laid out—handmade, intricate, temporary by design.

People spending hours creating something they knew would be walked over.

There was something in that that felt… significant. Even if I couldn’t quite name why.

And a few days earlier, the four of us had hiked in between Santa Cruz and Tzununa- the other pueblos scattered along the lake.

It was something I had been wanting to do for months, but never quite found the right moment for.

And then it just happened—planned the night before, no overthinking, no buildup.

The three of them had found each other quickly. There was an ease between them—inside jokes forming, conversations flowing without effort, a kind of rhythm that didn’t need to be thought about.

I was there.
Part of it.
Included in every sense.

And still, I could feel myself just slightly on the outside of something I couldn’t quite name.

It wasn’t anything anyone did.

No one left me out.
No one made me feel like I didn’t belong.

If anything, it made it harder to explain.

Because the distance I felt didn’t come from them.

It came from somewhere in me.

Walking along the lake, I caught myself noticing it again.

Not in a sharp way.
Not even in a painful way.

Just a quiet awareness.

Watching the way they moved together.
The ease of it.
The familiarity that seemed to build faster than I’m used to.

And underneath that, something else.

Something that felt a little like envy.
But not in the way I would have named it before.

Not wanting what they had specifically.
Not comparing.

Just… recognizing something I might be missing.

Or maybe something I haven’t been letting myself fully want.

I’ve been writing a lot lately about old patterns. About the ways I learned to show up in relationships. About how much of that was about staying steady, staying contained, staying in control.

And I can’t tell if this is connected to that.

If this feeling—this slight distance—is something I’m still carrying.

Or if it’s something else entirely.

Maybe it’s just what it looks like to be in between.

Not where I was.
Not fully where I’m going.

Just aware enough now to notice what I feel, without immediately knowing what to do with it.

Because what stood out to me most wasn’t the distance itself.

It was the fact that I could feel it.

And that instead of pushing it away or explaining it,
I just let it be there.

Quiet.
Unresolved.
But noticed.

-A