What Did I Look Like When I Was Happy?

"When I was a girl, my life was music that was always getting louder. Everything moved me. A dog following a stranger. That made me feel so much. A calender that showed the wrong month. I could have cried over it. I did. Where the smoke from the chimney ended. How an overturned bottle rested at the edge of a table.
I spent my life learning to feel less.
Every day I felt less.
Is that growing old? Or is it something worse?
You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer


I am told this is obsessing. Me, the counselor, I recognize it, thank you. Reality is, she doesn't want to hear about it anymore. Mourning is over, be done with it already. Move on.

I am told to love myself first. Oh, but I do. I didn't need anyone to complete me. Within moments though the glimmer, the bow on this marvelous gift of life, was gone -- I didn't know it would be the last time... I didn't know, I could have held on tighter.

The world is rushing by outside the window, cars pushing through the dark, rain-soaked streets, barely stopping at the crossroads, barely looking. I have sat here for hours watching cars. Maybe one will be the one I want, turning on to my street and in my drive and I will rush to the door, to be happy again.

What did I look like when I was happy?

So many of us go around with plastic smiles because we are told that is the way to do it. No one wants to see your pain when they are covering their own. But I won't lie and say it isn't there, crushing my chest like a physical weight. I have lost someone dear, and this day I am allowed to feel that loss! In my day I will cry and let you hide from me. Don't think I don't know, you cry too.

I trust one morning, I will wake to lighter air, breathing deeply and consider, this hurts less. I may not even see it coming, but it will.

I have faith that someday I will wake to contentment again, like back when I awoke next to you. And have your memory be not ever of tears, but only of light and love, suspending my happiness and leading me down the next road.