Something Broken
Someone once told me, that the beautiful thing about something broken, is that it can be in two places at once.
I think this is wonderful, given that I always wished I could be in two places at once. To soak in more beauty, more knowledge, that the world has to offer.
According to Plato, humans were once whole, but the gods split them into two, fearing their power. Even though split, each half is linked by their origin, carrying the memory of its completeness. The separation never diminishing their identity, it only intensifies their quiet yearning, hope, that someday, somehow, they might be made one again.
The beautiful thing about being in two places at once is that these parts will always be considered part of a whole. That never changes. Once something has been mend together, that’ll forever be a part of the identity of its respective parts. No matter how far the parts travel. No matter how much time passes.
But one day, when the parts meet again, when they are mended at the place they were first broken, they’ll only inevitably fit perfectly together again. This time, with a stronger glue, cautious, given its knowledge and experience of its fragility.
At this time, the parts will return to being a whole. But the glue they use to mend back together will be chosen wisely, because they’ll have the knowledge to choose appropriately. The knowledge they may only have been able to acquire independently (maybe the gods were onto something).
Whether two parts can still make a whole doesn’t depend on whether it was ever broken into two. It only matters that after it is broken, the correct glue is found. Maybe it won’t be glue at all that mend the parts back together. What will do the job may even need to be tried and failed, but when the right substance is found, the whole won’t be able to help itself but to look perfect again.
I think that the beautiful thing about something broken is that it can be in two places at once. But forever, they’ll be part of the same whole. Even if it is never mended. Even if the right adhesive is never found. Even if no one bothers looking.
