HAVE YOU SEEN MY HEART?

I think I’ve lost it. It’s not the first time. 

I wake up, sometimes, thinking about it. Wondering where it is. How could I have misplaced it? Again! I’ve really loved it, for all these years. I’ve depended on it. We’ve gotten through some really big things together, my heart and me. 

As a little girl, it would beat so briskly on certain days of the year – like birthdays, or Christmas. And when I was slightly older, it fluttered and skipped at the touch of another’s hand. I had to learn how to pick up the pieces of it, when I so brazenly trusted it to one who caused it to flutter. More than once, it shattered, and all the pieces were mine to collect and reassemble. I did it though. It always came back, stronger. We’ve always been good partners.

When I was older, but still young enough to have dreams bigger than I could afford, there were occasionally some dark times. I would lie stone still, and just will my precious heart to stop. I would stare upward, and feel the crushing pressure of Everything on my chest. “just, stop” I would quietly implore. I saw no sense in all the pumping and the swishing. Tomorrow, in my mind, would be better off without me and my heart. 

The stubborn tomorrows kept coming, as I find they are wont to do, whether my heart was in it, or not. My ventricles and valves were persistent and loyal. Despite my quiet and desperate pleading, my heart turned a deaf ear to my request for it to cease. It beat on. (thank you)

One day, not on any one day I can point to specifically, after weeks and months of my heart’s dutiful and boring beating, I finally felt a familiar swell from within. It was almost imperceivable at first, but as swells do, it gathered great momentum and strength. My dear heart opened like a canyon, and grew so big I believed anything was possible, once again. I couldn’t shove enough wedding days or babies’ birthdays, or unabashed ambition or grizzly death inside it. It expanded, completely uninhibited, reaching all the way to the horizon, with every single human experience inside of it, and it melted and became one with the glowing sun that rested upon it. 

And this is how it goes. The heart opens and contracts. All the living you can imagine happens inside of it. Occasionally, it swells so big with ecstacy, it explodes. It can fill so deeply with pain, and break so violently – a team of professionals is needed to clean up the bloody, pulpy mess. This is the glorious and catastrophic state of being alive. All the love. All the joy. All the pain. All the fear and hopelessness. All the All. 

But then, when you least expect it, the heart can just simply go missing. It cannot be explained. Those like me will recognize, a heart that is missing is far more unsettling than one with a crack. Fixing it? Can do. Finding it? A murkier situation. 

Imagine – you’re just going about your damn day, and there’s that sinking feeling. I’ve lost my heart. You think – Am I just tired of it all? Have I lost hope in humanity? What happened to the dreams I dreamt? Why are people so endlessly disappointing? Where is the flaming and technicolor passion about everything I once felt? Did someone break in and steal it? How did this happen? Is this just another shitty facet of menopause?

This feeling of displacement, loss and frustration can be panic inducing – leaving me to ruminate about where my shiny bejeweled tender heart could have disappeared to. 

I’ve been looking in every nook and cranny, and combing through the aisles of Substack. I meditate, and take long walks. I rummage through every drawer in my dresser in the middle of the night. I throw myself wholeheartedly into my work. I hug my boys extra tight, and snuggle my husband like there’s no tomorrow. I try all my old tricks that have helped me get back to the heart of things in the past. Still, heartless.

Where are you, my old familiar friend? Where the hell did you go??? Life just isn’t the same without you. I promise to do better, and take better care of you, once you are firmly re-positioned between my mind and gut once again where you belong. We need you to run the show! Hello? Can you hear me?

There’s an elusiveness to finding your heart, once it is lost. I know this because I’m well practiced in this ancient art. It’s akin to getting pregnant, or beckoning a cat to come rest in your lap. You cannot demand the heart’s return. You can only hope, and be ready at any moment, for it to slip through the back door, and reignite your soul, on its own terms. And it happens when you least expect it. (I can’t’ wait)

Heart – please know this. I am no longer so arrogant and rude that once we are reunited, I would dare to ask you, my valiant ticker, to stop doing your job. I no longer take each beat for granted – each rush of blood that flows through me because of your magic power. I am wiser now, and know better how to care for things I cherish. I’m waiting for you to give me another chance. I hope my luck hasn’t yet run out.

I ask this of you, my friends – if you stumble across my one and only tender heart, or if you have an inkling of where to look for it, please urge it to come back to me, or give me some helpful hints. 

I’m here waiting – ready for my big beautiful heart to fill me with hope and light, once again. I’ll be ok, but It’s been eluding me for too long now. I’ve been living in black and white without you, dear heart of mine. I love you. 

Please come home.

Love every day, 

Julia