Joy Unconfined

In the course of conversation I was asked “What makes you cry?”

And being really bad at conversation, and not mentally quick enough to sufficiently evaluate and come up with a concise answer, I gave an easy one. Not untrue, mind, just easy. I said “Usually happy things.” using a recent wedding as example. And it is quite true. Joy (not me) is the best way to find tears, and the easiest, most accessible. The most ‘allowable’ for those of stoic constitution.

But the question resonates. Reverberates, really. It criss-crosses my thoughts, and I think on it a bit, it flitters away, and returns later, floating in front of me, daring me to commune with it a litte more.

I don’t generally like to cry. (Not that anyone does.) I will grit my teeth, clench my jaw, and steel my gaze in order to avoid it. That whole ‘sign of weakness’ thing.

But I do cry.

Here are other things that make me cry.

Heartbreak and rejection. I’d say those are universal. But you know that moment when you realize the person you love more than anything in the world just doesn’t love you back? At least… not in the same way. That aching, black void that opens up inside your heart and threatens to swallow every bit of the light you’ve ever held? Realizing that no matter what you do, how hard you work to change yourself, what you’ll give up, none of that will matter, because it’s not you in the first place, it’s the other person, and there’s just no fixing it unless they do it? And they wont? Yeah. There are tears there.

Suffering. Not my own. I can bear that, because it’s mine, and I can either do something about it, or somehow I’ve brought it on myself, either directly, or it’s my karma. But the suffering of others…true suffering. The people staring at the ruins of their lives in the aftermath of natural disaster. The children whose eyes plead for the chance to remain innocent in the face of atrocity. These things can bring tears.

Transcendance. This one’s hard to describe, since I’ve only felt it a few times. But you know those moments when what you’re experiencing completely transcends the reality of the moment? It’s entering that alternate reality on the wings of music… not when the music lifts and buoys you to delight. I’m talking about when it flows through you, resonates in your pulse and oozes from your fingertips. It re-emerges as your voice, in gestalt with the voices of others, and creates a bright halo above you. None of this is visible. But you feel it. It’s as real as the pores in your skin, the hair standing up on your arms, and radiates from you, surrounds you, and bathes you in its perfect light.

Too gushy? Ok, but that’s what it feels like. And it brings tears. Better than sex. Unless… well… it’s PART of sex. But that’s only happened once for me, and was so fleeting I wonder if I imagined it. The other times it was longer, and better, and part of music.

So there we have it. Tears.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 23rd, 2006 at 10:24 pm and is filed under miscellanea. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.