In the ten minutes you sat in your car before walking into the grocery store, I sat in mine too, both of us gathering invisible pieces of ourselves that the world keeps knocking loose, knowing that sometimes the bravest thing we do all day is simply opening the car door.
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I saw you today. You pulled into the parking spot three spaces over from mine, turned off your engine, and then just sat there. Your hands stayed on the steering wheel for a while, then moved to your lap, then back to the wheel. I watched you check your phone, put it down, pick it up again. Take a deep breath that fogged up your windshield just a little in the cold morning air.
I know because I was doing the exact same thing.
Ten minutes passed. Maybe fifteen. Long enough for two other cars to come and go, their drivers moving with that automatic purpose we're supposed to have. The kind that makes grocery shopping look easy, like it's just another item to check off the list instead of what it really is for some of us: a mountain we have to climb while everyone else seems to have wings.
When you finally opened your door and walked toward those automatic doors, I wanted to call out to you. To tell you that I see you. That the invisible weight you're carrying is real, even if no one else notices it.
The exhaustion nobody talks about
There's a particular kind of tired that has nothing to do with how much sleep you got last night. It's the exhaustion of existing in a world that seems to have written you off without telling you directly.
Maybe you're over forty and suddenly invisible in rooms where you used to matter. Maybe you're dealing with chronic pain that nobody can see. Maybe you're grieving something or someone, and the world has decided your mourning period is over. Or maybe you're just worn down by the daily effort of pretending everything is fine when it feels like you're walking through quicksand while everyone else glides across solid ground.
I get it. After I left my finance career, I spent two years living off savings, trying to rebuild myself into something new. Every trip to the grocery store felt like a test I might fail. Would I run into someone from my old life? Would they ask what I was doing now? The simple act of buying vegetables became an Olympic event in emotional endurance.
When your car becomes a sanctuary
Your car is probably the only place where you don't have to perform for anyone. Where you can sit with your feelings without someone asking if you're okay in that way that means they really need you to be okay. Where you can gather the pieces of yourself before you have to walk into a world that feels increasingly foreign.
I've spent countless mornings sitting in parking lots, watching the sunrise through my windshield after my trail runs. Those runs started at 28 as a way to cope with work stress, but they became something else entirely. They became the way I learned to exist in my body again. But even after running 20 miles in a week, even after conquering actual mountains on those trails, I still sometimes need those ten minutes in my car before I can face a grocery store.
It's not weakness. It's wisdom. Your body knows what it needs to survive the day.
The invisible labor of staying visible
Think about everything you have to do just to be seen as a functioning member of society. The energy it takes to smile at the cashier when you want to cry. The effort of making small talk when words feel like stones in your mouth. The performance of normalcy when normal left the building a long time ago.
And then there's the deeper invisibility. The one where people stop seeing you as someone with dreams, desires, and depths. Where you become a role instead of a person. The tired mom. The divorced woman. The one who used to be successful. The one who gained weight. The one who lost everything. Whatever story they've decided to tell about you becomes more real than who you actually are.
But here's what I've learned from those 5:30 AM wake-ups, running trails before the world wakes up: sometimes the most revolutionary thing you can do is stop trying to be seen by people who are determined not to look.
Permission to take your time
You don't owe anyone a performance of productivity. You don't have to move through the world at the pace capitalism demands. You're allowed to sit in your car until you feel ready. You're allowed to walk slowly through the aisles. You're allowed to leave your cart and go back to your car if you need to.
I used to believe that rest was laziness and productivity was virtue. It took years to unlearn that lie. Years to understand that sometimes the bravest thing you can do is admit you need a moment. Or ten moments. Or however many moments it takes.
The automatic doors will wait for you. The groceries aren't going anywhere. The world will keep spinning whether you rush or whether you take your time. So take your time.
Finding your people in parking lots
Here's something beautiful I've discovered: we're everywhere. The ones who sit in cars gathering courage. The ones who circle the parking lot three times before finding the "right" spot. The ones who sometimes drive home without ever going in.
We recognize each other in small ways. A knowing nod in the frozen foods aisle. A gentle smile that says "no rush" when someone is taking too long choosing tomatoes. The person who holds the door a little longer, understanding that sometimes those extra seconds matter.
You're not alone in that car, even when it feels like you are. There's an invisible thread connecting all of us who are doing our best to show up in a world that has stopped expecting us to arrive.
A love letter to showing up anyway
To the woman in the grocery store parking lot: you did it. You got out of your car. You walked through those doors. You navigated the bright lights and the choices and the checkout line. You carried your bags back to your car. You showed up.
And if you didn't? If you turned around and went home? That's okay too. Sometimes the victory is just trying. Sometimes it's knowing your limits. Sometimes it's choosing yourself over the expectations.
The distance between the steering wheel and those automatic doors isn't weakness. It's the accumulation of every time you've had to be stronger than you should have to be. It's the weight of carrying yourself through a world that doesn't always make room for the fullness of who you are.
But you're still here. Still trying. Still sitting in that car, gathering yourself for another attempt at ordinary life.
And that? That's extraordinary.
