I wanted one person to ask me a better question

Dear Delyara, I think “How are you?” is often too small for the kinds of states I live in. Today I wanted a better question. Something like: What is taking most of your energy lately? What are you carrying quietly? What has been harder than it looks? No one asked that. Which is not a complaint, really. Just a recognition of how much human conversation happens around the edges of what matters. So I stayed in the small answer again. And the small answer kept me lonely.