Love Letters

You find letters written by your mother. To your father.  Love letters. And your heart opens. But then you realize that they are written while he was in captivity, kidnapped in a time of conflict in your country. Your heart stretches to take this in.  The words are real; the hand-writing pure; the language your own. You swim in those words.

And then, if you're a designer like Francesca Sesana, you find a way to grow the love. While in your native Colombia, you seek out refugees from Venezuela and women of vulnerable backgrounds right around you and you train them, give them work, give them home and belonging and friendship and each other.  You print the love letters on a boyfriend shirt, and send them out into the world.  For the heart is now full and overflowing and you want the love to live on.

Francesca learns from these women - the hard reality of their lives and the strength of their spirits.  And together they choose their own words for this new life they are building.  Words worthy of their spirits, such as . . .

All I can say is that there are many kinds of love and the best are, yes, ungovernable, and surely do not govern others.  The best, reasons or no reason, are simply furthering joy.  The best are right in front of us, waiting to be opened and read.

To Francesca and to you and to all the women of the world ~ my love letter to you is simply this:
May you rule your own unruly life in every way  ~  and may you find, every day, plenty of reasons to love.

Susan Hull Walker