The girl with the broken heart

                I remember when I was a little girl, I read about white queens of the past dying of long broken hearts. I imagined castles wrapped in snow covered hills and long burly fir trees stabbed into the sides creating tears of forests that darkness could hide. Trapped in the winding halls of these flawless castles in a white washed walls lain a heart broken queen sprawled across a lace covered bed with doctors coming in and out. Then the white queen died leaving a sullen king in her wake.

                But now- years later, in my ivory tower, there is no king to my white queen and no castle to hide in. The chest pains had been happening since before January but I didn’t think it was anything. Nerves, stress, anger or upset; it could be anything. Right? I’m not in the age where this happens. But the stabbing pains got worse. But I would just wait it out, it would get better right? I managed to keep them at bay. I used exercise, yoga and meditation to keep the beast at bay.

                A new dawn had broken and I was lucky to start embracing the things that I loved that had fallen by the way side. I started making plans and things were beginning to look sunny side up. That was until my birthday. I hadn’t celebrated my birthday for years and with good reason. I celebrate my birthday and shit hits the fan, so I just gave up on it until this year when I thought it was time to start celebrating life. But come 11:50 pm on the evening of my birthday, I had a horrible phone and the dominos started to fall from there.

                I pushed back the actual party date and maybe I should have kept my tradition up and not celebrated. Twelve days later my heart broke and I felt betrayed by a friend. A nurse strongly suggested I go to the ER because I might be having a heart attack. It was in that second I looked in the mirror and knew that my world would never be the same. Moments later, I was in the hospital hooked up to monitors and being stabbed with every pointy thing they had in the ER attached to me. I mourned over the stupidity of the words I’d said. A feeling I so rarely knew, regret.

 I’d like to say it was my version of Mr. Big who broke my heart or the so called best friend who lied to me but the heart of the matter ultimately lies with me. I still had time to change or at the very least change my life for the better. I thought of my grandfather and grandmother who had died from a similar condition in their 50’s. It was in this thought that I realized, now more than ever I was living on borrowed time. It didn’t matter that I ate healthy or exercised everyday (even if for a few minutes) I could be gone within seconds. I’m at peace with who I am and most of what I’ve done. I’ve lived a full adventurous life and that is something to be proud of even if there is no after life. I watched a large clock tick by and came to terms with my dances with death.

                They found a lump pressing on my heart along with several irregularities that drove me to tell the people who didn’t know I care about them to reach out to them. Clear the air with Mr. Big and there’s a good chance that things will never be the same and he is truly done with me. But at the very least he knows where I stand, how I feel and that no matter what my feelings will never change. I made it a point to tell people who I thought are beautiful that they are stunning. I let the artist know that he is worth more than his weight in paint. Allow the professor to know that he is a good person inside and out, that forgiveness is always given.

                I have come to the awkward acceptance that maybe I’ll never find true love or have a happy, healthy family but that doesn’t mean I can’t reach out help the world. My heart maybe broken but my life is just beginning and it begins with the stroke of a few keys.