Page 32 of The Library of Second Chances
Each day, I take one step closer to knowing and accepting myself.
My presence shapes moments and touches lives.
Annie had given her a book on affirmations for her fifteenth birthday. Dozens of statements filled the book, and Annie had helped her pick out the ones she’d felt comfortable saying. Ever since, she’d made time each morning to focus on positiveaffirmations. Those she used now felt like the right ones for her; however, it had taken years before she could say the final one she repeated each day:My presence shapes moments and touches lives.
Saying it and believing it were two different things, but Annie had assured her that the more she said it, the more she would start living it. So she dutifully repeated the words each day and focused on believing them.
She’d stayed up late the night before reading the book Gatsby’s Ghost had left her. After flipping through the pages in her journal, she found the affirmation she’d copied from that book, the one he’d drawn the arrow by: “Yes, you can move mountains. Whatever is happening right now, this is it. This is your life. And it’s not going to begin again. You can’t change the past, but in five seconds you can change your future.”
She looked out to the ocean and said out loud, “You can move mountains.” The downtown business owners had entrusted her as their leader, and she wouldn’t fail them.
Maybe it was time to add some new affirmations to her daily routine.
Lucy channeled what she’d read in the self-help book as she thumbed through the well-worn volume Annie had given her, its spine broken in numerous places and an edge of the paper cover torn in the bottom right corner. She flipped to a random page, closed her eyes, and ran a finger down the page. Opening her eyes, she frowned at her choice:I grant forgiveness to those who have caused me harm in my past while honoring my boundaries for the future.
That sounded like something her therapist would have told her when she was in her twenties, when she’d been trying to make sense of her mother leaving when she was only five. She and Taylor had been drinking cosmos one night while watchingSex and the Cityreruns in their college apartment, when Taylorhad the idea to look up Lucy’s mom on the internet. Lucy’s dad never spoke about his wife after she left, and Lucy knew it was too painful for him to discuss. Her mother had made no attempt to contact them, and her mother’s parents had only ever known she was alive and living in California trying to make it as an actress.
In the early years, Lucy had been angry at her mother for leaving. Then somewhere in her late teens or early twenties she’d grown worried. Was her mother okay? Was she healthy? Happy?
Fueled by courage from a good cosmo, she and Taylor grabbed one of their computers and searched for her. If what Taylor found was accurate, the only thing Lucy’s mother was acting in was community theater. That was what she’d broken up their family for—community theater in Riverside.
It had taken Lucy another ten years of therapy to get to where she was now, which was indeed detached. She no longer cared where her mother was or what she was doing. Missing all those years with Lucy were her mother’s loss. Annie had been twice the mother Lucy’s own flesh and blood could have ever been. It was a cruel twist of fate that Annie never married or had children while Lucy’s mother had a child she clearly never wanted.
Lucy was in her late twenties before she allowed herself to understand that her mother’s problems had nothing to do with her and certainly hadn’t been caused by her mere existence. Maybe adding this new affirmation would remind her just how resilient she already was. She wrote it on the inside cover of her gratitude journal before trying it out loud.
“I grant forgiveness to those who have caused me harm in my past while honoring my boundaries for the future.”
It wasn’t the first time she’d felt as though Annie had guided her to the right words. She wasn’t sure if she believed in spirits or their ability to interact with the living world, but she alwaysfelt as if Annie was right beside her when she closed her eyes and let her finger find a new affirmation.
And Gatsby’s Ghost had helped her find another.
She closed her journal and gave herself one more moment to enjoy the sound of the surf, the harsh tenor of waves crashing mixed with the cries of laughing gulls overhead, and the feel of the sun on her skin as the day heated up.
Satisfied, she smiled. It was time to head into work and see how she could use her talents today.
Lucy decided to stop by the Little Free Library on her way into work. Curiosity had got the better of her, and she wanted to see if Gatsby’s Ghost had picked up the latest book she’d left for him. Each time she left a book, she worried he was simply a tourist passing through town and the book would never be picked up because he’d already be gone. The thought brought about a feeling she recognized after years of therapy as “abandonment,” but it made her sad just the same, even though she had no idea who he was. It was a nice distraction and the first time she’d really felt a connection with someone since Carter moved to Chicago.
Chickadees were chasing one another from tree to tree as she walked through the park, and Lucy stopped for a moment to admire a hummingbird fluttering around a bright-pink hibiscus bloom. It was hot already, even at nine thirty in the morning. Continuing down the path, she waved at a toddler who was smiling at her from his stroller as a family passed by on the sidewalk.
As she approached the Little Free Library, she reminded herself of the gift she’d given the community with this idea. Everyone loved the library, and it had been so popular they’d had to build a bigger one. She tried to stop and acknowledge how her idea had positively impacted the town and its people,but self-doubt crept in. The little library wouldn’t have been necessary if she’d been successful in raising money to save the much larger public library. Would she fail the town again with the waterfront?
The Mel Robbins book from Gatsby’s Ghosttalked a lot about taking action and how any action, regardless of its outcome, was a step toward success. He’d marked a quote that said something like, “Win or lose, at least I’m doing something.” She’d taken action and out of those efforts had come this Little Free Library, which had brought him to her. So maybe it wasn’t a total loss. He seemed to bring her the right message at just the right time, much like Annie always had. Perhaps Annie had had a hand in it too, just like with the affirmations.
It cheered her slightly to see that the book she’d left for Gatsby’s Ghost was gone. So far, their system seemed to have ensured they’d each received the books left for each other.
After scanning the shelf of children’s books, she selected a few new ones and took them off the shelf so she could read the cards. She giggled at the one written in green colored pencil aboutAlice the Alligator.
Alice is nice. She mite like Sidny. He wint to my skol 1 day.
Charlie
Lucy always stocked plenty of children’s books on alligators in the store. The local kids all knew Sidney and wanted to learn more about alligators, and the tourists were always wide-eyed at the idea of running into a pet alligator on the island. Alligators did hang out along the freshwater creek that ran through the island, but tourists rarely ventured away from the beach or downtown to spot them.
By the time Lucy left the library and walked over to the bookstore, her mood had turned positive again. As much as she loved helping adults find the books they were looking for, nothing was better than helping a young or teenage reader find the right thing to read. From understanding something new to feeling understood, Lucy firmly believed there was a book for everything.
As Lucy was turning on the coffee pot in the back, she heard the jingle of the bells on the door. Walking to the front, she saw a woman who appeared to be in her early forties scanning the shelves of new releases. Lucy didn’t recognize her and assumed she was in town visiting.
“Hi, welcome.” Lucy smiled when the woman turned. “Can I help you find something?”
