A very long time ago now, it rained when I went to Tahiti. The kind of lush tropical rain that made you want to dance in it without the benefit of an umbrella. There was a hand in mine, a shell around my neck, and a black pearl pressed into my open palm, and – just for that one delicious carefree moment – life was beautiful.
It was years ago. In a great many ways I was more innocent than I am now, but then again, every day changes our innocence, every day we wake up a different person.
Beauty can take many forms, it can fade, it can tarnish, or it can simply change.
The beauty that was with me in the Tahitian rain so many years ago changed; it’s still in my life, in a different form, a better form, but it came and went, and something else offered a different kind of beauty to take its place.
But some places will always belong to people; no matter how much circumstances change or people drift away. No matter how much relationships break and mend and break again. Memories are attached to places, and nothing will change that. No matter where I go, or what I do, I choose to allow Tahiti to remain Kitty’s. Because I never want to forget how beautiful I felt dancing in that tropical rain.
Tomorrow I will walk through Tahiti with my hand in someone else’s, a different someone, a different path, a path I do not regret in the slightest, a different beauty…but still, my heart will remember…what it’s like to dance in the rain.