In a society so obsessed with the revelation of salacious details, what does it mean when someone voluntarily shares secrets?
She gains very little by asking me these questions and forfeits her security by being so candid about her feelings. That she would ask me in order to verify her own observations would mean she thinks that I'm incredibly brilliant and that twenty-somethings are actually perceptive and/or mature enough to contribute to her own thinking. I think not.
More likely she asks me to test both my heart (and thus my trustworthiness) as well as my mind. If she can let me in to befriend the two children she describes as "my everything," she has to decide whether or not I possess the sincerity and honesty - in addition to the smarts - she wants me to share with her kids.
But I think that she is warning me about these people who seem so warm. In many ways they are incredibly generous - but there is an exclusivity that she wants me to know is impenetrable. Perhaps it is to protect me from disappoint and illusion.
Why are secrets so interesting? Because the reason for their revelation is a fountain for imagination and intrigue.
