Heartbreak

To risk an obvious reference to Dave Chappelle as Rick James, heartbreak is a powerful thing. You can feel it coming sometimes, or it hits you from behind when you feel like you've finally gotten over the crest of a really hard time and are running freely down the hill. It comes in many forms--It could be the end of a relationship that was so happy for so long, you'd thought you'd seen your future defined in it. It could be the completely horrible timing of a new friendship that seemed to show an inexplicable amount of potential but halts as quickly as it started. It could be an immediate reckoning with the mortality of your father, which shockingly comes alongside the simultaneous discovery of the mortality of a man who you love as much as if he *were* your own father.

How do you deal with it? I'm not sure of the best method, but I've certainly tried several in the last few months. Spending hours under blankets with the dog. Spending time with your best friends. Spending time getting lost in crowds of strangers. Spending time with near strangers as if they were your best friends, because they don't recognize the look on your face that says "I'm not sure if I can really handle all this." Self-destructive activities of physical, emotional, and even psychological natures, not even on extreme levels, just doing things that might take your mind off of what you can't honestly deny is consuming it 24 hours a day. Music. Louder music than you generally prefer, harsher chords and lyrics, angrier voices than your close friends would ever put on an ipod playlist for you. Singing--songs that range from completely overindulgent and maudlin to funny, stupid, or just plain terrible (I'm lookin' at you, Taylor Swift.). Running--without the GPS watch, without the "training playlist," just running until you can't run anymore. Luckily for me, I've been blessed with two little girls I babysit who love to have "dance parties" in the den. Somehow, spinning a 6-year-old around endlessly to Miley Cyrus's "Party in the USA" has magical healing properties.

My 30th year started out amazingly, but frankly, this patch is not an easy one. So many unexpected things all at once, it's hard on the (aging :)) heart. I'm going to think on it further, hopefully I'll have some insight in the end, but for now, I'm gonna go hug Louis one more time and head up the hill in my running shoes. GPS watch remains uncharged...all the better. Noisy indie rock that Matthew would swear I was going to hate? It may be first on the playlist tonight. Fish and chips for dinner, too. Again with the self-destructive physical choices...if I eat vinegar on the fries, it's at least less sugar than ketchup, right?

To the six or so people who actually read this, thanks for the love you're cramming into all the cracks right now. It means a lot, more than I have been able to show recently. If you pray, pray for Daddy, Ed, Mama, and the Sterns. They need it a whole lot more than I do right now. I've got y'all, Glen Hansard, the PNC Bank earwarmer from last year's Thanksgiving 10K, and British pub food to keep me going, at least for now.