The Broken Road --14.Sept.08

I'm going to tell you something I rarely tell people.  Yesterday was a bad day.  I rarely talk about my "bad" days because they generally aren't all that bad.  No reason, I feel, to focus on the negative, when it usually isn't the focus of my day.  Even when I don't feel great, I find the positive things and choose to look at them until the negative things fade away.  And they always fade away.

But yesterday it was like I just couldn't see the silver lining no matter how hard I looked.  The weather was absolutely perfect, so I decided to get outside.  It was also Open Monument Day, so there were people and children and activities all over the city.  I really tried to throw myself into it all, but there was just a sadness in me that I couldn't fight.  Even the sunlight did nothing for me.  Finally, I decided to stop fighting it, and just let it all flow over me.  I have reason to feel sad.  When a lovely flame dies, smoke gets in your eyes.  But my pain yesterday went deeper than a broken heart.  It's not that I have so much sorrow in my life.  In fact, I am lucky to have very little sorrow.  But it was like every bit of sadness that has passed over my heart in the last year came back upon me.  So I let it flow and just cried and cried.

"Hoy sufro desde más abajo.  Hoy sufro solamente.  Me duelo ahora sin explicaciones." --César Vallejo

Then I called my mom.  :-)  Talking to my mom is always a good idea when I am sad.  I get my positive attitude from her and her experiences in life.  She was always so positive and never afraid of the future.  Sometimes I forget how much of my world view comes from my mother.  She really understands the way this Universe functions.  She doesn't use the vocabulary many people use; she knows nothing about religions other than her own.  She doesn't know about Buddhist philosophy, or Tao teachings, and I'm pretty sure she's never heard of the Bagavad Gita, but she gets it.  Made my journey much easier.  I am a lucky girl.

She told me to just cry and to just feel it all, and then to stop crying and move on.  She said sometimes you just can't fight sorrow, and shouldn't try to.  Sometimes it just takes hold and shakes you around, and all you can do is hold on. But she also reminded me not to forget that it'll all pass by in its own time.  This pain, she told me, is just leading me straight to where I need to be.  In life, in love, everything.  You can't change the past, she said, you can't see the future, so what's the point in worrying about any of it.  :-) 

Sometimes, even though you know something, it takes hearing someone else say it to make you feel it.  Thanks mom.

Every long lost dream, led me to where you are

Others who broke my heart, they were like northern stars

Pointing me on my way, into your loving arms

This much I know is true

That God blessed the broken road

That led me straight to you.

(The Broken Road -- Rascal Flatts)