I got on the bus after work. I left the office just a few
minutes after I got the text. “Confirmed.” I didn’t leave the office because I
was upset about the news. And I didn’t leave the office early or rushed, except
that I was rushed because I was about to miss the bus. However, the timing was
serendipitous, as it was best, as the news sunk in, that I was on the bus. On
the bus, though surrounded by strangers, I was also alone, sitting in my own
row, able to turn my face to the window that I knew was tinted so that no one in
traffic could see me as we passed. And the roar of traffic, the hum of the
large bus engine, and the loud air conditioning system were enough to give me
hope that I was in my own space; that all that noise would separate me from my surroundings like walls, enough to drown out my silent cries and distract from my anguished side face sufficient that no other passengers would
notice. It came faster than I thought it would, and I was so glad for it.
Glad to cry? Yes. I wanted to cry all the way home. I wanted
to cry long enough so that I could come home and see Ben, and he would see me
and know that I was hurt. And I could cry about it in his arms. But I knew that
was unlikely because the bus ride is about 45 minutes, and after that time
passes, I have a 10 minute drive from the park and ride. And I rarely cry for a
full hour. I was sad. And thinking about my own sadness about this made me feel
quite vain. After all, it wasn’t my news. Why did I need anyone to see me? I
was already crying in public, after all. And yet, despite my wish to expose my
pain, I had my hair as much forward in front of my face, and my face angled
towards the window as much as possible, so that none of the other passengers would
be exposed to my intimate, and exposed emotions.
I cried because I was defiant in the face of the news. I
refused to accept it and yet I knew I was helpless to change it. Confirmed. I
had assumed for the last two weeks that this would be the news. They’d already
told me there as about an 85% likelihood this was the case. And I had already
cried about it multiple times. Did I really need to cry about it again?
Apparently. And I was glad to. My heart was feeling broken. I let my mind
explore all the fears this diagnosis could conjure. Fears of mine, and
threatening realities for all those closest. I don’t want these visions to
become true. I thought if I stopped thinking about it then my tears would stop.
But even in dwelling on my own selfish desires, desire to be crying and to cry
with Ben, for my own selfish purposes, the tears did not
stop.
I cried up until we pulled out of the park & ride stop before mine.
That was about 30 minutes into my 45 minute ride. I would not cry all the way
home after all. As I suspected. But I would defiantly leave my mascara all over
my cheeks so that he knew. I would not wipe this hurt away or soften it. I
wanted it to be recognizable and clear. As I pulled down the mirror in my car
visor to see how ridiculous I really looked, I was surprised by how
much more my right eye had teared up than my left, as evidenced by the uneven
distribution of black crumbles of mascara over my two cheeks.
I drove home a stoic. And I walked in the door. Ben was just
a few steps away, sitting at the computer in the office, which has its doorway
facing the door to the garage, where I entered the house. Upon hearing the stir of my arrival, he said, “You’re home! How was your day?" It was a very normal, cheery
greeting. And though I had wanted to weep in his arms, the normalcy evoked a reflexive
normalcy in myself. Suddenly, I wanted to say “Good. How was yours?” And I
would have probably responded that way to anyone else, even in that moment, on
that evening. But it was Ben. And before I replied, I admonished myself to
respond acknowledging what had happened, as if to respond normally would have
been disrespectful. I would have told him earlier. I would have sent him a text
too. But I left my phone in the office in my rush not to miss the bus. And perhaps because I was more frazzled by the news than I had thought. He would want to know
too. And so I responded with something that let him know that I’d gotten bad
news, but I can’t really recall what I said. He said, “They got the results
back? What did they say?” And only then did I look at him, and said, “I think
you can guess.” And he saw my make-up stained cheeks. I was so glad for them,
not for my vanity that he would know I was hurt, but because it meant I didn’t
have to say any of those words.
Saying things out loud is more earth-shattering
than just understanding something, and it would have been painful to do in that
moment. It was shattering enough that we were acknowledging the news out loud.
Even in indirect references. I was glad not to have to say the words. Or word,
as it were. I put my bags down. And Ben, as sweet as he was, and as strange as
it must have been to him as I am not sure if I have ever cried in his arms, even
after five years of marriage, came to me to give me comfort. And to my relief,
all the tears came right back. And I cried for a few moments.
I made sure not to cry for too long. After all, I had cried
on the bus enough. Was it controlled crying? What's uncontrolled crying? My emotional outburst was paradoxical to the controlled thoughts in my head. When is it proper to stop? Should I stop now because I'd already cried enough? I don't want to wear out Ben's shoulder. Perhaps if I don't stop myself now, I could go on forever. Or just too long. Stop now? Now? Now. I can stop now. I never seem to let my brain turn off enough
to let my emotions have their way. They never take me over completely. And I
wondered if at this point I just cried because I was in a habit of crying,
rather than crying because of the news.
But maybe that’s how it
is when you get bad news. Perhaps the news itself is like a dagger. And it
wounds you. And even if you remove the dagger, and don’t think about it, you’re
still wounded. And you still bleed. And it bleeds out after that, whenever something
brushes up against it to break up the scab, be it external provocation, a passing thought, or just because you're moving around too much and hurting things inside that are still fragile. Yes, it’s like a wound.
This does not explain the joy in my tears. There was a
time when I did not cry like this. When tragedy would strike those I loved. And
while I knew my soul was wounded, or at least very much should be, I did not
feel the wounds. As a young girl, I remember riding on the bus from school, conjuring
up imaginings of family tragedy and personal losses, just to see if I could get
myself to cry. I suspect that on a subconscious level I was aware I was
disconnected from my feelings. But I didn’t know they’d been dislodged from me like
one might have a dislocated shoulder.
It wasn’t until I started dating Ben that
I learned I had issues with emotional dislocation. I found myself on several occasions during our courtship crying for no
reason, unprovoked, without any daggers to my soul, by odd triggers. And I went
to therapy because I had no idea how else to figure out what was going on. And
in therapy, emotions I had buried, unable to acknowledge at a much more
tender age, came bubbling up to the surface. I acknowledged them out loud
for the first time, over 20 years after they happened. Quiet all that time. And yet still there. I
had no idea until then that there were words I had never said out loud. Or that
saying things out loud mattered so much. Or hurt so much. And they were
shattering to say. But they were also very healing. All those years, I had no idea
how much I wasn’t feeling. My emotions have since come back to me, taking their
place close to me, more and more as time goes by.
So it may seem strange to some. And though
it is selfish and odd to put it this way, I was so grateful to be devastated. I
wondered if it wasn’t possible the Savior was also glad in the garden of
Gethsemane to feel all he felt for our pains and our anguishes and our wounded
souls. Because I think, at its most basic level, pain is often the thing that
connects us. For me, it is an evidence of my devotion and my love. But rather
than a conscious sense of devotion as I’ve had in the past, it is instinctive.
I have been wounded and I can feel this wound. And each time they come, though
I would wish these daggers to cease to exist, I would never wish to not feel
the resulting pain from the emotional wounds and share in that agony. For those you love, you wish to feel
nothing less.
