A Far Away Look

A couple nights ago, I went down to dinner at my favorite haunt, the cafe at the corner. Since I brought Porky along and dogs were not allowed indoors, we sat outside. I didn't much notice the table in front of us. We sat down and ordered. While waiting for my order, I accidentally listened in the conversation at the next table.

One girl was telling her girl friend about how hurt she was, how she did not expect this, how there was this other woman....

Her girl friend tried to console her, to trash the guy, the other woman, it didn't help the case and the tears flowed....

The storyline was not what caught my attention.

What caught my attention was when the girl friend got up to go to the bathroom, the hurt friend just sat and waited, looking at the street with the saddest faraway look. She wasn't focused on anything, anyone. She just sat there with red rimmed eyes and looked into the distance, into the past. I could still see her pretty profile. That faraway look....what was she thinking?

In my previous post (the excerpt), it said, "When you love someone, you are also loving everyone you have ever loved before. You carry with you every relationship, every hurt, every joy, every pattern...." Somehow, sitting there looking at her, I could feel her pain, her longing, her tears, her trying to be strong, her wanting to go back in time, her wanting to do things differently if she had the chance, her wanting another chance with him.

I was surprised at my degree of empathy for this girl. I think it's akin to the feeling you get when you cry at a sad movie, only this is more acute because it's not fictional. Love wounds are the most difficult to heal because it's a third degree burn. The skin needs to grow over the wound and it takes time, plus, the process is painful. You have to revisit the wound each day to clean it, and feel the rawness of the pain again.

As I am writing, this quote by Alfred Lord Tennyson popped up, "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."