The Broken Heart

 

 

A broken heart sneaks up on you. When loss occurs, we all go into defense mode. Try to minimize the damage. We labor under a delusion that just perhaps this one time we can skirt by and act as if it never happened. A broken heart is like a snake bite. When you are bitten you think that maybe it’s a “dry bite.” Even a rattlesnake can bite like a dog. No venom, just dog teeth. That can be bad enough, depending upon the dog, but there aren’t any hidden ramifications.

But there’s that bite that really doesn’t hurt until . . . You notice that you don’t feel the same. Something is missing. Something you’d grown used to that’s simply no longer there. And you know that you can skirt. Something will never be the same. Something that fades over the years yet is still “there.” And it comes back late at night. When you are alone. And you cry as if it just happened. Then, the next morning it’s gone. Then it’s there. Then gone again.

A broken heart is like that. It won’t kill you all at once. Just a little at a time. A little, a little more, until there’s little left. Nothing left to give. Because now you know better. You can live with a broken heart. Nobody will notice. But you do. Walking away becomes easier because someone walked away from you. And you will lie. You will tell “next” that they are “only” but they aren’t. “Only” left you, and they’re never coming back.

Nothing you have done, are doing, or will ever do change “Only’s” mind. It is gratifying to see you hurt. For real or imagined wrongs. And forget about “growing.” You leave a part of yourself. If your heart is truly broken it can never be broken again. You may say you have found love again, but you never will. There is only one Miss Right allowed for each life. It may not be the first time, or the tenth, but if you lose Miss Right, everything after that is Miss Right Now. And it doesn’t have to be a romantic encounter. It is who you think about the first thing every morning and the last thing every night, be it grandmother, granddaughter or anything in between.

They take a piece of you, but they leave a piece of themselves. Even if they won’t admit it. But the simple fact is that it truly better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. And some nights you will smile. And remember. And for a few moments you will be one. But then, you always were. From the beginning of the universe.