Still Answering the Same Question
I found a photo of me the other day. Maybe five years old.
Leaning casually, holding a landline phone like I’d done it a hundred times before.
I used to love answering the phone. I’d sprint to get it before anyone else could. And when I did, I’d say “Hello, Melanie Jayne Ludke speaking, how can I help you?”
My full name. Because that meant something.
I talked a lot back then. I always had something to say. But I also lived in my head. Dreaming. Imagining. Certain there was a future waiting for me, even if I couldn’t see it yet.
I wanted it all and I didn’t question that I could have all I that I wanted either. I think that’s where it started. Not just the talking but the listening, the noticing and the being ready. “How can I help you?” It sounds simple, but there’s a lot sitting behind a question like that. I learned early how to read a room, how to adjust and how to keep things steady. Not because anyone told me to, but because when you learn what works you learn how to belong and you get good at it.
It’s strange, looking at that photo now.
I still spend so much of my time on the phone, just not the one with the cord! Now it’s calls, messages, conversations that matter and supporting people through things that aren’t always easy. For a long time, without even realising it I was still asking the same question. “How can I help you?”
But something about it has changed.
It’s not coming from pressure anymore, or from trying to be what’s needed. It’s coming from choice.
It comes from knowing where I stand and from understanding the difference between being there for someone…and disappearing in the process. That little girl wasn’t wrong. She was perceptive, full of energy and certain she could have a full life. She just didn’t know yet that she was allowed to take up space in it too.
I still ask, “How can I help you?” But now I don’t leave myself out of the answer.
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