Train Wreck.

If you are in an horrible car accident and you are able to walk away from that twisted wreck of metal left behind and the bones are not broken and the bruises have faded, do not think for one second that you have not been in that car wreck.

Somehow it seems easy to believe that, when a relationship ends in a horribly painful disappointing way, we can close that part of our heart up, lock it up in a box and shove it in a corner to forget about it. Why worry about a bad relationship when you should be thankful that the train wreck it was came to it's inevitable conclusion and things are over? NEXT! Pick yourself up, be thankful for what you have, for who you are, and be grateful that you dodged a bullet. Why shed a tear over someone who did not care enough about you to be decent? Why waste time or energy on someone who has clearly not given the same kind of consideration to you? Many times have I breezed by with a grateful smile, knowing I am better off and declaring, "He does not deserve the air time," "If that's how the relationship was going to be I'm better off without it," "Better to find out what he's made of now than 5 years and 3 kids later!" and always my favourite: "He does not deserve my tears."

The problem is, even if we are in a car wreck, and the metal is burning and the glass is shattered and the sound is ringing and the smell is sickening but you can walk away with no broken bones; you were still in a car wreck. It would be foolish to assume that when the bruises fade, so will the damage from the accident. Because the last thing you want to find out when you're cruising on a brand new street in your favourite new car that you love being in because it is so good to you, is that you have to go to the hospital for internal bleeding that started from a lousy accident you had two years ago.

Many times I feel that it would be ungrateful of me to feel sadness over such a wreck. I should be glad that it's over. I should be glad the timing was now and not later, when things were deeper, when stakes were higher...What I've found is that a lot of us are walking around feeling this way. As a consequence, we are surrounded by the injured, and it would break my heart to find that, when we are most happy with our someone new that those old hurts that were simply shoved into a corner, only resurface later and hurt someone who wasn't even at the scene of the crime.

I admire those of you who can express your feelings so freely, with no fear of the consequences. I look to your example and hope for the bravery and courage it requires to trust someone else so completely that I no longer have "always one foot on the ground." If only all of us could fall so completely, so openly, with the immense faith it takes to know that you will fall in order to be caught.