Who's left when it's gone?

Everybody admits the health fear. The other one stays unsaid. Who am I if I stop? It's hard to picture yourself without the thing that's shown up in so many of your pictures. Blank, maybe. Ordinary. Someone with empty hands and nothing to say. That fear can keep a habit alive longer than any craving.

The answer's been coming in all along. Think of the last time you laughed so hard you had to grab the table. The time you were kind to someone who hadn't earned it. A lousy afternoon you got through in one piece. The cigarette stood nearby for some of it and signed its name on all of it. Every one of those moments came from you.

You know those old photos with a thumb over the corner of the lens? Nobody crops the thumb out and wonders where the party went. The picture just gets clearer. What makes you laugh, what you're stubborn about, who you call first when something breaks. None of it ever needed the thumb. God put all of that in you before any of this began, and He's kept every bit of it safe.

Say one true thing about yourself out loud today, something with nothing to do with any of this. It'll sound ordinary. Good. Ordinary was never the enemy. That's you, uncropped. Then hand Him the blank spots. Show me the rest of me, Lord. Who's left when it's gone? All of you.