I’m not good at not getting hurt. I can’t harden my heart. I don’t know how to build walls, and I can’t help but fall madly in love if that’s what my heart is set on. Oh, I can try. I can hate it while it happens, but I have no control. The heart wants what the heart wants. Yes, this is going to be that type of post. The type that’s full of cliches.
This has resulted in a lot of heartbreak. When I’m in a room with my friends and peers around my age, I can almost guarantee that I’ve experience more heartbreak and worse heartbreak that they have. It’s not fun. It’s not a title I want to own. I’m not glad that I’m almost a professional broken-heart and yet..
Something about the whole thing is reassuring. I was so afraid to come out of my divorce broken and afraid to love again. I made sure that wasn’t the case. In fact, the opposite might be true because hear I sit broken-hearted over someone I met just a month or two after I decided to get back on the scene. One might point it out as a case of extremes but I like to think of it as using something that’s meant to be used.
They say hearts aren’t meant to be broken but I disagree. If your heart isn’t broken, you’re not using it, and the heart is a muscle is it not? It’s meant to be used. There are so many analogies floating through my head as I compose this post. The one that seems the most fitting is that of a baseball glove. A brand-new glove isn’t as effective. You need to break it in, to mold it to your hand. Creases and dirt and stretchmarks are the sign of a job. No, it’s not always a job well done, but it’s a job you tried at. Sometimes a break isn’t a sign that something went wrong but that it was used in the way it was made to be used.
I can’t think of a single reason that I would have this tool, my heart, and not want to at least try to use it. It’s like buying a brand new wrench to hang on your pegboard. Sure, it’s shiny but sometimes a little rust shows just how well-loved something is, and what is a heart if not made for love?
My heart is full of scars and scratches and signs of use. No one could ever accuse me of being closed-off or cold-hearted. Love hasn’t always done me well, and I haven’t always received the love that I wanted, but this doesn’t make my broken heart and less worthy. It perhaps makes it a project, but you can shine up almost anything with a coat of paint, can’t you?
Sure, the process sucks. Living through heartache is no one’s idea of a good time. Sometimes it takes longer than I’d like to rebound and there are certainly people who could be more gentle with my heart, but every fracture, every scars is a memory, a lesson learned or a connection to someone else. A shattered heart just goes to show how deep that connection was, how good I am at using my heart.
So the heartbreak? I’ll take it. I’ll struggle through it, and I’ll come out the other side ready to do it all again.
