I Woke up today with that soft, sore feeling you get after a hard cry or a long sleep you didn’t know you needed.

The light came in slow through the blinds, not pushy, not loud—just a gentle reminder that the world was still turning, and I hadn’t slipped off the edge after all.

Yesterday, I sat on the bottom step and called my own name back.

Didn’t holler. Didn’t chant. Just whispered myself awake.

And today, sittin’ there again with coffee warm in my palms, I felt something I hadn’t felt in a long spell:

A little shift.

Small as a heartbeat.

Quiet as a secret.

But real.

The bottom step felt different beneath me—

same old cracks, same splinters, but the wood seemed to lean into me,

as if sayin’, “Alright, baby. Day One was recognition. Day Two is reckonin’.”

MawMaw’s words drifted down like dust in a sunbeam.

“When you stand still too long, you start forgettin’ who you are.

But once you remember… you gotta choose yourself again the next day.”

And Lord, wasn’t that the truth.

Calling yourself back is one thing.

Keeping yourself close?

Whole ‘nother story.

I sipped my coffee slow, letting the steam rise like a small prayer.

I could still feel the weight of all that stillness I’d been trapped in.

Depression don’t lift overnight—

it’s more like fog burnin’ off the fields after sunrise.

Thick at first.

Then thin.

Then gone…

until it comes crawlin’ back on another cold morning.

But today, at least, I wasn’t swallowed by it.

Today, I felt my edges again.

I thought of another one of MawMaw’s porch-worn truths:

“The world ain’t forgot you, baby. It just waits to hear your voice again.”

And sittin’ there, I realized yesterday wasn’t just a moment—

it was a hinge.

A subtle turn in a rusted-over door.

I’d cracked it open.

Today, I stepped a toe through.

I didn’t do nothin’ big.

Didn’t conquer a mountain or clean the whole house or paint some masterpiece.

But I brushed my hair.

I opened a window.

I breathed deeper than usual.

And when the wind carried the scent of damp earth and pine needles, I let myself feel it.

Let myself be here.

Be alive.

Be a woman tryin’ instead of vanishin’.

MawMaw always said revival ain’t thunder.

It’s a spark catchin’ on dry kindling.

And today—

Day Two—

felt like that spark.

Tomorrow might be messy.

Might be heavy.

Might knock the wind out of me again.

But this morning, on this bottom step, with the porch light still burnin’ above me even in daylight, I knew one thing for certain:

I am finding my way home to myself, slow and stubborn as a wild vine fightin’ back toward the sun.

And this revival?

It ain’t flashy.

It ain’t loud.

But it’s mine.

— If Day One was rememberin’, Day Two is returnin’.