hi, nice to meet you.

 living all the way at the tippy top of an island allows you super fun, lengthy train rides filled with opportunity after opportunity to analyze/sympathize/smile/laugh/nod etc.. a few days ago a teenage girl hopped on in one of the two harlem stops wearing a skin-tight, see-through, low cut top and some crazy ugly booty leggings; and to accessorize, a super big gold dog collar (you can't even call this thing a necklace) that said "TAKEN".

my first thought was, "BY WHO?! do they know you're dressed like this?!" and then i thought of all the girls i've read about, watched, ached for - who are victims of sex slavery right here in my city. i thought about listening to a seemingly (and understandably so) exhausted rachel lloyd talk and write about how "girls weren't drug addicted, they were love addicted" and how that, she'd learned, "was far harder to treat."

maybe this was one of those girls who just wanted to belong somewhere, to be a piece of something. even if it means being a piece of the most disgraceful/unloving puzzle that could ever be. or maybe she was just a girl dating a guy who wanted her to wear something like that. or maybe she was just a girl who wanted everyone to believe she was taken, even if she wasn't technically so. maybe she just wanted someone to know her name.

my sweetest new addition to the abare blood line (who is unfortunately a country's width away from my arms) has made her way into this world. she goes by mirò west abare (pronounced muh-row). but for about nineteen hours, i didn't know her name. i've gotta be honest with you: because of the distance, the fact that her gender wasn't known to anyone the entire time she was baking, and the fact that i didn't know her name - i felt little connection with someone i thought i would immediately feel like a leech to. i was grappling for information. i actually felt scared - like something was wrong with me. if you know anything about me, it's how obsessed with my niece and nephew i am. but the second i found out her name, it's like this connection washed over me. despite there being no formal introduction or me even getting to say, "hello!" i felt instantly bonded to this little six pound, eight ounce baby girl who will always be my niece. 


i thought... hmm. it's amazing what a name can do. someone comes along and gives you a name and boom - you are known. loved. not that she wasn't known or loved before she was formally given a name - it just made it different. i feel like a name is a declaration. and her name means "peace". 


my sister-in-law, kara, and i share a lot of things but music has to be the biggest. we have always bonded over this. we pay dangerously close attention to lyrics and feel connections with songs like they're people. it might be weird, but it's how we roll. she was saying that the new sara bareilles song, "once upon another time" felt like everything she's ever wanted to say. and i said how cool it was that God designed us for connection, despite introduction. kara doesn't know sara. sara doesn't know kara. but for some reason a connection is there, even though it may be one way.


i think i'll let God keep doing what he's doing, and i'll keep hanging on the edge of my seat to see who gets named what and how i can love them no matter.