Things We Bring

Life is an ever evolving movie full of twists and turns. Within each of us lies a story interesting beyond words if we could only know how to tell it. Watch any movie and there will be times when you are excited, depressed, happy, sad and incredulous that such things could really happen. But guess what? Amazing things do happen in ordinary people’s lives that we never know about, never see. And as quickly as those amazing moments flash alive, they flicker into memory and are stored away.
I am forever amazed at the complexity of the human relationship. Relationships have a maze like quality. No two are the same. One might lead us on an incredible journey while another may lead us to a dead end with no easy way out.
When people are young, perhaps 14 or so they begin to seek out relationships with an opposite of their gender. Most of their experience has been with family or friends who are like them. Suddenly they begin to notice pleasing aspects in members of the opposite sex.
These relationships are the first step in their travelogue of life. A young boy and girl bring to this experience an innocence. An almost pure attraction. Not yet have they been wounded by others so they explore this relationship with excitement. They are learning themselves in a whole new way. They are fun to watch although often they are almost nauseating in their innocent enjoyment of having a significant other. Sometimes these relationships which are born in youth, endure, grow and last a lifetime. Unfortunately, more often they die a natural death and the participants move on to another playing field.
No relationship that follows will have the same purity of spirit. For suddenly, there has been hurt. Someone cared more than the other and someone’s heart developed a little crack. And that slightly damaged heart is forced to move along life’s highway in search of another vehicle. The hurting person now brings with them a wariness and distrust. The offender develops a self assured cockiness that thickens the skin and hardens the heart ever so slightly.
These two people move in and out of life. Through darkness and light they bump against other travelers and sometimes they rest in a new relationship for a while. And the mold has been set, the die cast. The hurting heart usually continues to be battered about and indeed can even look for the ability to inflict pain in others. The crack becomes bigger exposing tender parts beneath.
It isn’t that a damaged person really wants to be hurt, but they have grown used to it. It clouds the vision and they can no longer “see” those qualities of pure affection. Deep inside, they yearn for something better, different, healthy. But they bring that poor little hurting heart along for every ride they take and soon the trip just doesn’t seem worth it at all.
And so, human beings bring along their baggage into every future relationship. Some have cute little monogrammed tote bags and they cringe at the sight of someone struggling to load their steamer trunk into a new experience. But all baggage both large or small is problematic. Because we bring it with us, we are never free of the events that packed it in the first place. Sometimes we even like to sit and go through our suitcases full of issues and relive them. It hurts and feels good all at the same time, like picking at a scab. Unfortunately, once we are through examining the contents of our luggage, we carefully repack it. We never seem to find even one little item that we can leave behind. In fact, now that we’ve began the reloading, we often find we have more to put back than when we unpacked. And so, we bring ever increasing numbers of cases and boxes. Now we need a cart to load them on. Soon instead of us hauling them, they are dragging us down the road of life. Occasionally, they can stack themselves into huge roadblocks that keep us from going forward and we’re much to afraid to go back. After all, we know what happened before.
The things we bring can be changed but it isn’t easy. Imagine getting to your destination without your luggage. Everything familiar is in that suitcase. Some of it you don’t even really need; you brought it “just in case.” That suitcase is a part of you, in essence it IS you. Now what? What if that piece of baggage is lost forever. What if it winds up in a baggage room in Milwaukee, untagged and unclaimed.
After mourning the fact that it is indeed lost, cursing the careless handling by those in charge and wringing your hands about what to do, you decide. You get yourself to the nearest all purpose store and buy a new toothbrush, shampoo and a pair of serviceable undies. You hang your travel worn clothes on the shower rod and run a hot bath and steam the wrinkles out of your slacks and your spirit as well.
And tomorrow the sun rises like always and you are still part of life. That suitcase may be missing, but you are still here. And, because you’ve lost your luggage, there is a brand new aspect to your existence.
None of us will live and love and be unchanged. We each will hurt and be hurt. We will stand and fall and stand again. We will bring our experience with us and try to educate our children.
What I hope is that along the way, we can begin to cast aside our baggage. It isn’t in the failure of a relationship that we find the thorn. The thorn is in never trying again, never allowing ourselves to trust. The thorn is waiting in one of those suitcases to prick our finger and make us remember our pain.
So bring with you instead your injured heart with a bright shiny SpongeBob band-aid. Open your heart instead of your baggage. Make the thing you bring a willingness to try and try and try again and bring your love and allow it to seek its’ mirror.