If You Need Me

Aletheia

If you ask me, you can never have too many skills. If you're intelligent, you'll find it wise to carry with you the tools you need to carry out the skills you have, or perhaps, the ones you may need.

I've acquired a new tool for a skill that I have and yet am still learning. It feels like knowledge old as time in my brain and yet new and shaky in my heart and hands. But this a tool that will be carried with me for most of my days, the kind that imprints on you. I'm already finicky with it, a set of rules, and an understanding that my approval must be asked before placed in anyone else's hands.

I know he would tell me it was against the rules we live by, no unnecessary sentiment for objects. However, I would argue that the familiarity concept is more important for someone like me in this case. My spine is glittered with steel, but bones still reside there too. "I'm leaning, still a girl growing" I remind my teacher gently.

I've thought of name after name. Thoughtful analysis of meanings and significance, yet one keeps popping up: Aletheia, the greek personification. "It means to not be hidden. To be evident."

Today I learned something about one of the soldiers I loved who died in duty. Something shocking, yet said so casually across the dinner table. A soldier himself (or something like that) let a secret he didn't even know existed slip from his lips. It's true what they said in World War II, "loose lips sink ships," because you never know what pieces together information.

Men are never truly gone until they are forgotten. We repeat that over and over again as a salve for the wounds we all feel. I wonder what happens to the little metal pinned to my coat in the back closet of my study in honor of my friend? Does the silver turn as the memory is tainted? The soldier tried to apologize for tarnishing the memory. A simple head shake tossed the thought away. I am of the belief that it is better to deal with reality while living in honesty than been allowed to hide and believe a lie.

Aletheia, you showed up at my table tonight. But I believe there is a better name out there for this tool of mine. I will instead wait patiently to see if you turn silver to ruin in the snap of a finger.