When you hurt enough to tell someone about the pain. And they say, "I understand," sometimes it makes you sadder. Because you know they don't. If they really did understand, they wouldn't be able to hang up, watch tv, check their email, read. I'm unable to do any of those things and take comfort in the mundane. They only understand a murky reflection of your pain. I guess this is what is called indulging in self-pity. I don't feel bad about dipping my toe in or wading around for a bit. I'll be level-headed some other day...

A Changed Heart, Different Words, Different Ways

You live life, you get older and hopefully while you travel down your road, you look back from where you came and who you were, and although flawed, you'll see that you actually have learned some lessons and have become stronger, better. It's inevitable that we make mistakes, and it's inevitable that mistakes will be made against us. What I have realized recently is that I don't really care anymore about having the last say or using my words as weapons to wound. I get no satisfaction from making someone pay by self-righteous words that meet their mark even if I feel I have been wronged. I've always believed that two wrongs don't make a right intellectually, but I now believe enough for it to have taken root in my heart. And at least this small litmus test tells me that even though my progress toward who I would like to be are made in small steps, they are being made. I am glad that there will be less times when I will have to regret some haphazard words spoken from self-pitying pain. Self-pity is not welcome in this house or this heart. I am grateful for God, family, friends -- those that truly love me. No matter how hokey or mushy that sounds, it doesn't make it less true.

If I could be but cloaked with perfect grace

I would soar high and show the breadth of love’s true face.

But the words are clumsy and fall heavy from my lips,

Weighed down somehow by old hurt's impure fibs.

I stumble, feeling my way,

Rearranging all these verbs and nouns

(love, want, need, you, I, we).

Imperfect though they are,

And flicked out with a carnal tongue,

The journey they started from

Was born from deep inside

And hope weaved in,

Between spaces of ever rearranging words.

And this I offer with unending faith,

The best of what I can

Till wisdom teaches true freedom,

And love can love with right grace.