The Only Chapter

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It's the little things that bind us together. The little strings of grace. The unexpected moments, the connections with total strangers.

This realization hits you one day, the day you were sitting at home, alone, bored, feeling like making bad decisions. Your number must have once belonged to a druggie, because you keep getting texts from people you don't know offering you marijuana. Not often, maybe every couple months. Usually you just block the number, like any sane person. But today you're feeling different. So when you get a text offering you weed for ten dollars, you (on a friend's recommendation) text the person a Bible verse, one about not destroying your body. You don't expect him (her?) to respond. He's probably pissed with you. Whatever.

Except ten minutes later, he responds, with a verse about God giving man good herbs to use. For a moment you're stunned, shocked—but then you laugh. And laugh. And laugh until the tears roll down your face. And suddenly, the gloom that had settled over you is gone, because here is a total stranger, one you would never, ever, talk to at any other time, sharing a joke with you. And through that laughter you've made a connection.

You text the drug dealer back. "Lol dude, you have the wrong number, but I love your sense of humor." He responds, "Lol." And that's it. You never talk again.

But still, there's this link now between you and that drug dealer. You don't know their name, or their age, or even their gender. But it doesn't matter.

And the thing is, that link of grace repeats itself over and over. It's there when you run into old neighbors in a completely different state. It's there when a parking garage attendant appears by the elevator to make sure you've survived. It's there when you wear your great-grandpa's sweater and you feel him hug you, even though you've never met him. It's there when the random woman at the pool where you work somehow knows exactly what is bothering you, and what to say to make you feel better.

It's all these things that show love with no bounds. You don't know these people, they don't know you, but they see the human fragility in you, and they respond—or it's purely a beautiful, random chance, like when you're laughing with a drug dealer. These people are not soulmates in a romantic movie sense, but you're still connected, soul to soul. It's a beautiful thing. It's what makes up life. It is life.

It's the everyday moments that create love without limits, love without bounds. 

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