I had stopped at a cute display of wine-themed gifts when it happened. As I stared at the mustache-shaped drink marker, I felt it. The pieces all tumbled out from my core and landed on the floor. They scattered all around me.

I made a fist with my left hand and pressed it up against the hole that was left in my chest, and tears gathered at my bottom lids, then quietly and carefully dropped onto my cheeks. I felt my shoulders rise and fall, with deep breaths attached. Not again, I whispered to myself. I actually began to wonder how there was any way I still had tears left.

I looked down at all the pieces, unsure of what to do. They lay there, to my left. My shopping cart to the right. I gently leaned over and began to scoop them up. A woman stepped around me. “Excuse me,” she said, and I barely glanced up as the shame overcame me and the tears continued to fall. I stood up and wondered where I was supposed to put the pieces I had gathered, and realized these pieces weren’t what you might expect from a heart. These were grey, beaten-up looking.

Almost like they were dead.

I’ve had a broken heart before. This one feels different. Grief comes in the ebb and flow of life, just like the waves obeying the moon. One crashed over me last night as I pulled my car into the garage when Cherry Blossoms came on and I heard In my soul I’m aching to grow/Longing for a love I’ve never known. It happened this morning when I read momastery’s blog right when the words I was trying to un-break broken things entered my heart.

They came last night when I was on the phone with my counterbalance and while I don’t remember what was said, (something about not being punished) I just remember lots and lots of tears. And then daggers to my heart.

Two nights ago when my oldest friend and I were talking, the tears came when he made me laugh about Oreos. I know.

But as I stood in the middle of World Market holding these pieces, I couldn’t figure out where to put them. They wouldn’t fit into my purse. My cart had Christmas presents in it. My pockets didn’t seem very practical.

I left the store and I honestly don’t know where they ended up. But I do know that when I turned into my neighborhood, I said to myself, I have to get over it.

But I also need a safe place to fall apart, to grieve the loss of this love, maybe just lose it all and then cry this pain completely out of my body. The problem is I don’t want to do it alone. But not anyone will do. The one with the daggers, the one whose chest I want to beat on even while my eyes are spent with weeping. The one I want, but not the one I need, to be this safe place. But I am too proud to let this happen yet at the same time can’t imagine anyone else understanding.

I’m still wondering where those pieces ended up.