June First

by Jennifer Hartmann

there is no logic in tragedy—tragedies just happen—and how we get through them, what we do after, is our only true power over them.

“I’m not going to ask you if you’re okay,” I tell her, stepping up to the edge of the bed and placing my hands in the pockets of my shorts. “I’m only going to ask you what I can do to help ease even a fraction of your pain.”

“You’re not responsible for the way others react to what you need to do to get better.”

He knows every dent and divot in my heart, and he knows how each one got there.

“I think about where it could have flown, and the life it could have lived…if I had just had the courage to let it go.”

Passion is meaning. Passion is purpose. And tragedy is simply the risk we take in order to experience it.

Do you want to know exactly what’s hiding in that light at the end of the tunnel? Well, I’ll tell you. That’s your legs working again after months of physical therapy. That’s the medication readjusting the chemicals in your brain after you took a razor to your wrist. That’s the bronze AA chip after a year of painful sobriety. That’s the warm tickle in your stomach when you find love again after a messy divorce. That’s forgiveness after you’ve hit rock bottom.

That light shines differently for everyone, but at the end of the day, it all amounts to the same thing. It’s the better version of yourself, the person you’ve been trying to get back to. It’s your healing heart. And a heart can only heal if you choose to let it.

True happiness is a puzzle. It’s a jigsaw puzzle we’re all carefully putting together, searching for those pieces that link and connect, that allow us to move on to the next part of the puzzle. Some puzzles remain incomplete, and I think that’s because many people don’t know what makes them truly happy. Or…they’re unwilling to take the time to find those other missing pieces first. They just want to squeeze the last piece into a space it won’t fit.