Heartstrings

You ever have those days where you're just so sensitive to all the heartbreaks in the world? For no apparent reason, I mean. Nothing like a refugee camp or a child dying or anything big like that. Just the little, everyday heartbreaks. The ones that don't really make sense.

Like the slightly dopey guy walking down the office corridor, holding his bottle of iced tea, loping along oblivious to everyone else, completely and obviously happy as a five-year-old with his iced tea. He loves his iced tea and he's so happy in that moment -- everyone else is walking along absorbed in their notes or their office-chatter -- he gazes down at his iced tea and looks forward to it. That just breaks my heart for some reason.

Or the woman in my office, talking to her daughter overseas, the longing in her voice so compelling as she feigns cheerfulness and then sighs when she puts the phone down. I want to burst into tears.

Or the consultant, annoying me with her professionalism, the polished veneer brittle over a lonely look coming from her eyes, an eagerness to connect that I shy away from, too aware of my own eagerness and shyness.

Or me, searching for the perfect eyeshadow at the drugstore, hoping that it will somehow make it all okay, ignoring the tug of tears in my throat, my second self trying to shield my everyday self from the heartbreak going on all around me.

Sometimes the veil opens and all the little heartbreaks and small joys that tug at my heartstrings are visible and it's overwhelming. I eat my lunch of cucumber and rice and avocado and try to ignore the knot forming in my stomach, the tension-tears headache forming behind my eyes.