Christmas Song

My very favourite Christmas song has long been I’ll Be Home for Christmas. Because I was kind of raised by television, I want to say the first time I heard it was not, as you might have suspected, on the beloved John Denver and the Muppets Christmas CD, but I’m pretty sure the first time I heard it was on a commercial. Folger’s, in fact. A son in the army catches a bus home, sneaks into the house, and smiles at the tree. I’ll Be Home for Christmas is playing in the background. The very thoughtful breaking-and-entering son decides to make coffee (Folger’s, wouldn’t you know it) and the mom awakens to the beautiful smell of dissolving caffeine crystals and heads downstairs with a smile, not for a moment wondering why Mr. Theif broke in AND decided to make coffee while doing so. When mom sees the son she bursts into tears and then the beautiful I’ll Be Home for Christmas disappears into: The best part of waking up….

Still. Love the song. It’s a very simple song – short, easy lyrics, easy on the ear (especially considering it was first done by Bing Crosby in 1943, and he’s got the voice of an angel).

I’ll be home for Christmas,
You can count on me.
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents under the tree.
Christmas Eve will find me,
Where the love light gleams.
I’ll be home for Christmas,
If only in my dreams.
Christmas Eve will find me,
Where the love light gleams.
I’ll be home for Christmas,
If only in my dreams.

Sweet. Lovely. Uplifting. This song-along with O Holy Night, which I like to pretend I can sing but can’t due to the high notes. Or I should specify – I can hit the high notes, but only if I am really, really drunk. Then I’m sure I sing like Judy Garland, if Judy Garland really was a drunk.
Oh wait.

I’ll Be Home for Christmas was a song. It was an instant coffee commercial. It was Old Blue Eyes on the radio. It was something I played on an endless loop as I had an endless parade of houses I lived in and endlessly moved from.

When I moved to Alberta I thought the “Only in my dreams” part of the song would mean I’d be dreaming of Christmas in New Brunswick. As for, the “I’ll be home for Christmas”, well that part did come true. Home just happens to be in the freezing cold of northern Canada.  Christmas arrived and there’s a big tree in the living room, there were stockings and presents and a big turkey dinner. I have a home with a wonderful husband and the cats.
This year,  I was home for Christmas. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.

Thankful

Many of you that have been visiting here for quite sometime know I moved across the country this summer. With the move came new friends, a new love and a new job.

It is Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada, some people will celebrate today, some celebrate will tomorrow but whatever day we choose it’s the time most of us reflect on the good things we have going for us. It’s a time to look on the bright side of life and list those things for which we are thankful. While pondering my own little list, I realise I am grateful for many things in my life, too many to even begin listing. But, I will say this … I so am thankful I decided to make that move.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Waves of Love

“I pray to be like the ocean, with soft currents, maybe waves at times. More and more, I want the consistency rather than the highs and the lows.”

-Source Unknown

Whisper

I listen to the ocean, and it tells me things. Even in the midst of this Western city, far from the ocean of my childhood, I still hear the waves whispering to my heart more, perhaps, than I want to know.

Puppy Love

When I love, I love hard. hard. Am I in love now? I’d say yes. Have I been in love before? I’d say yes to that one as well. But it is different.

When I was say, 17, I thought I was in love. There was this guy. I cared about him very deeply. I loved him, I loved him hard.

When I look back, I know that I didn’t feel the same way about him that I do about my current love. That doesn’t necessarily mean that I didn’t love him. When people say that. “You’re 17 you’re not in love, it’s just puppy love!” It’s true … it isn’t the same. That doesn’t mean that it any lesser of a feeling. Your heart is full to the uppermost level it can be given your maturity. That’s love.

Love Found

Over the past year I’ve been too stubborn, afraid of getting hurt, and unwilling to take chances. Funny how life throws a curve ball your way and it changes everything.

The idea of opening my heart to another was terrifying but after a year I was finally ready to the take on the challenge, realising the unlimited possibilites that would come from sharing my life with someone … someone who loved me back.

Everyday Love

“She wants to know you love her. That’s all anyone wants from anyone else, not the love itself but the knowledge that it’s there, like new batteries in the flashlight in the emergeny kit in the hall closet.”

– Jonathan Safran Foer

Lost Love

So true…

No Words. No Fuss.

Would you mind if I sat a while with you?
No words. No fuss.
I just want to sit in your warmth, feel your breath, and share in your light.
The crazy day keeps knocking on my door, begging me to come out from under these sheets.
But you’re too good to pass up and the day can wait.
I’m happy with you, happy enough to forget all about the clouds that were settling in just before you lit up my life, bright and sunny for the world to see.

I Am Happy

I was tired of everything. It felt like I was falling apart. I thought I had given up on love. Along with a number of events, I dug myself a hole where I seemed to lose myself in confusion.

But somehow, one night, I was found by this beautiful person, with a heart of an angel. The first night we talked uninterruptedly for hours, and we continued to talk the next day and the next and the next… we continued to talk. We spoke with words and looks and smiles.
 
He took my hand as he walked with me; I smiled all night long. Before I knew it, time passed and I am where I am today.

There’s so much more of this story but its just details. What matters is that these weeks, these months, have given me hope, a light to count on. I know for sure that my heart lies in his hands; I’m not afraid. His eyes tell me that nothing can go wrong. His heart tells me I am happiness. His words are nothing but the truth.

I know now, for sure, that there are saviours in this world. They may be rare, but they are there.

He is amazing. I am happy. 

Inevitability

Can you really ever be friends with someone from the opposite sex? Is it inevitable that one will fall for the other? Is it human nature to fall in love with one of your friends?

Time Changes Everything

When was the last time you really crossed my mind? I can’t remember your smile. Nor can I recall your face with perfect clarity. That cologne you used to wear, I can’t recall the smell anymore. I don’t look for your car when I’m driving and my heart doesn’t skip a beat when I do. Time has changed everything. I’ve finally moved on.

The Journey

No relationship is ever a failure if you manage to learn something about yourself. Just because it didn’t work out doesn’t mean it wasn’t a necessary part of your journey to becoming who you’re meant to be.

Heartache

Most of us have been in a relationship that has turned sour and my guess is we’ve all felt the hurt that comes with that.

We feel miserable, depressed, and lonely. How do you move on from the heartache? It’s not easy, but it is do-able.

A good friend told me:

“It is not the end of the world. You are still going to wake up tomorrow and eat your bagel just like the day before and the day before that. Life is not over. You are still you and no one can take that away from you.”

She was right. 

Love The Little Things

There are little things about everyone that I love. Generally, I think that this makes me a better person. I try hard to appreciate something in everyone.

The part where I always get into trouble is when I actually do fall in love with someone. Sometimes I have a hard time differentiating my everyday love from my I-want-to-be-with-you-everyday love.

Sleepless Nights

I have been doing a lot of thinking in the recent weeks. The kind of thinking that takes place when the night is at its darkest and those thoughts seem so loud in the silence, so loud that they chase sleep away.

There is the never-ending stream of memories I would rather forget. I think about how my heart has been stretched, squeezed and popped so many times that it’s a wonder it is still beating.

I think about how everything around me is changing and sometimes all those changes are too much for the heart to handle. Sometimes it’s too easy to get lost in these thoughts.

Eventually I do fight these thoughts away, forcing myself to think of something else. But not before they’ve done their damage. 

Another Time

“Is it too much to ask for magic? Am I too old to be expecting butterflies anymore? Have I lost the innocence and naivety needed to feel infatuation again? As I lie in bed next to Mr. Perfectforme, I inevitably feel the sneaking snake of doubt come creeping into my mind. I feel guilt for feeling doubt because I should be letting myself go, falling in love, head spinning. But I’m not. I’m thinking of dishes in the sink, presents to be wrapped, e-mails to reply to. When I roll over and see his amazing baby blues staring at me, I don’t get flutters and flickers. Instead, my mind floats back to another time, another place, another set of arms which, when wrapped among, gave me the flutters and flickers. I miss those arms and those feelings. I would give anything to have one more night in those arms, the butterflies flying crazy inside of me.”

– Susan

Something

I want something to happen. Something that will make me believe again. Something that will make me want to put my heart out there again. Something that will make me want to learn to say “I love you” again.

The Mystery Of Love

I’ve been thinking about love and what a mystery it is. Why do we fall in love? Why with X rather than Y? Why do some relationships fail so quickly while others last a lifetime?

Therapists and scientists and writers are constantly looking for the secret of love and its seeming unpredictability but they’re still as baffled as ever. Cupid is a capricious little thing and her arrows land in the oddest places.

We fall in love and fall out of love. Why? There are as many reasons as there are people. But an astonishing number of couples split up for no other reason than boredom – they’ve just got nothing to say to each other any more. And I find that sad. 

Indifference

“Indifference is the real opposite of love. To love or hate, you must care about the person. To be indifferent is far worse.” -Source Unknown

*This quote hits me hard because I am guilty of being indifferent. A defence mechanism used to keep the walls around me. I am afraid to let my guard down, to let anyone know the real me. Oh I throw bits and pieces out now and then but the real me is safe behind my walls. 

Protected Heart

In the past I’ve protected myself against falling in love by holding a part of myself in reserve. I want the other person to go first. Once upon a time I wasn’t afraid to go first, to be the person who liked the other person more. There was a time when I was able to be brave. And then I got damaged and I wouldn’t go first anymore. So I stayed aloof, kept a part of me separate and always watched the other person for signs that would let me cut and run away. It has protected me from getting hurt again. But I think it protected me from finding real love too.

What I Fear

I’ve spent my life feeling like someone who was on the move. An itch would get under my skin and inflame the hairs up and down my arms, tingling through the back of my neck. Little imperfections in my environment would become huge gaping holes propelling me to go, to move, to change for the sake of change. I always – always – saw an ending for me that was somewhere alone. It’s cheesy but true – my ending in my mind was always me, living alone, with a couple of cats. I wasn’t afraid of commitment … I was afraid of abandonment. Love to me was always something you left before it left you. End of story.

But my story has changed now. Life has changed that for me. Love has changed that for me.

Life is an open question now, one that I stare at a great deal – surprised that I get to have a life I never thought I would, never thought I could. Every single day is a surprise because nothing is the way I once suspected it would be.

Right now it’s about determining how to let go of how I always saw the end and allowing life to take me where I’m meant to be. With who I’m meant to be with.

I’m Fine Without You

I don’t need you to smile anymore; I can smile on my own,
I don’t need you to feel loved; I’d rather be alone.
I don’t need you to laugh, because here I am laughing,
I don’t need you to live, I don’t see me dying.

Thought I couldn’t be without you, but I’m fine,
I don’t need you anymore to be mine.
I don’t need to cry over the times apart,
I’m fine without you; I’ve taken back my heart.

– Source Unknown 

Don’t Stay Lonely

I can honestly say there is nothing more wonderful than having someone to love and the feeling of being loved in return. Our hearts may have been broken but we all learn how to fly again, soar high and to be brave, not fearing anything. We began to see the beauty in the world and there is so much joy in life… unless we stop hoping for love.

Boundaries

“At some point you have to make a decision. Boundaries don’t keep other people out – they fence you in.

So, you can waste your life drawing lines OR you can live your life by crossing them.”

– Source Unknown

Broken

Nobody really ever knows how much anybody else is hurting.

We could be standing next to somebody who is completely broken and we wouldn’t even know.

Convincing Myself

The hardest thing in the world is convincing myself I don’t care, when in all actuality, I know that deep inside I really do.

It’s hard to get over people, I mean really get over them. You can start to have feelings for other people, but it doesn’t mean you’re over them, it just means you’re moving on.

Happy Birthday Canada!

You’ve come along way in 143 years.   

 

Hiding From Love

“Maybe you’re just afraid that someone might actually want be with you. Because then you couldn’t hide anymore; you’d be out there taking a risk on something that may or may not work and that’s not good enough for you, is it?

I’ll tell you something: love is never 100% positive. You can’t fall unless you take that risk; and if you don’t take that risk, you’ll be hiding forever.”

– Source Unknown

Love Cuts

“You should tell them the truth. Tell them that if they hold on too tightly, love might cut them. Tell them to hold on tightly anyway. Tell them everything is worth it and that the richness of life is only ever enhanced by its inevitable, brief flashes of sadness and loss.”

– Iain

Love With No Fear

I wish I had my innocence back so I could love with no fear, fully and deeply…

… like I had never been hurt.

Together

If I had found more ways to love you, maybe these nights wouldn’t be so cold, and I wouldn’t be walking around these suffocating streets with my insides out.

But the strings that tied us together got old. They frayed like children’s shoelaces. We hung precariously — you swinging your feet as if the fall wouldn’t kill you, as if you were gazing out to sea alone. Me holding my breath, trying not to move, trying to keep it together.

If I could just keep this together.

Everyone has a reason for getting up, for doing it all again.
Coffee.
Sunshine.
Backyards.

I wish I could have been your reason for getting up.

-Susan

Love Is…

Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.”

-Erica Jong 

Flying on Silver Wings

Something’s happening. I can feel it. I feel different roads that lead the other way.

I am moving today. Flying on silver wings to my new home, my new life, in the West. I have so many thoughts running through mind … will I find a job & how long will it take … will my cats be okay on the flight … thoughts on missing friend and family … how will I survive the terribly cold winters … lots of different thoughts. But mostly I, am excited to begin this new chapter, One Girl’s Adventures in Western Canada (non-fiction),  in my book of life.

I may not be here for a few days, depending on how long it will take to set up new Internet service. But, I’ll be back.

 Me 

Reminds Me of You

Call it a cliché. Call it whatever you want, but it drives me insane how every time I turn on my iPod so many songs reminds me of you.

What’s your problem? Invade my mind? Fine. Invade my heart? Go ahead. But invade my iPod? Really?

Break-Ups Suck

“There’s no doubt about it – breakups suck. But in the first few hours or days or weeks that follow, there’s one important truth you need to recognize: some things can’t and shouldn’t be fixed, especially that loser who dumped you or forced you to dump him. It’s over for a reason, and deep down inside you probably know what that reason is.”
-It’s Called A Break-up Because It’s Broken by Greg Behrendt & Amira Ruotola-Behrendt

Love Is…

… love is a verb not a noun.

Love is the action we take daily, moment by moment and year by year.

After much heart searching and thinking I have decided to love as a verb. I have decided to choose love over fear. 

Reasons

“I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they go right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart, so that better things can fall together.”

 – Marilyn Monroe 

Linger

Oh, I thought the world of you
I thought nothing could go wrong
But I was wrong, I was wrong

If you, if you could get by, trying not to lie,
Things wouldn’t be so confused and I wouldn’t feel so used

-Cranberries Linger

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥  

Everyone who told me to “give it time and you’ll be okay” was right. I have finally reached the point where I am not continually reminded of you.  Oh, I occaisonally think of you, but I don’t allow thoughts of you to linger. There is no point living in the past. I don’t need you in my life. My future is bright and I’ve ultimately realised that my future will be brighter without you.

The Bruised Mess That Is My Heart

The only way that this will work is if I keep you at bay; don’t let you get inside the wounded, bruised mess that is my heart.

When you talk – your words are void of the deepness that I long for – I realise that you are not the man I should be sleeping next to. I realise that I’ve made the biggest mistake of my life, again. But for whatever reason – your smile, your eyes, your smell – I can’t bring myself to do the right thing. Just tell you that I am not into this, that you are not what I need right now. Instead, I continue to let you think, believe, feel, get attached.

 What am I supposed to do? Crawl back to my own bed, alone, cold, and unwanted? I’d rather keep you distant but right next to me. Keep the ideal you – the one I was praying that you would turn into when we met – in my thoughts and in my mind. Does this make me desperate, shallow, cruel? I’d rather lay with the wrong person knowingly than spend another night alone. I’m a mess of miscalculations and misreadings, but does that mean that I should go back to alone?

A brave person would come clean, would admit to only needing you for your embrace. But brave I am not. I am afraid. I am weak-kneed. I am terrified to wake up and realize that I am totally, utterly and completely alone. So I keep you at bay, all the while knowing that you are falling and falling and that I am just waiting for the right moment to slip out into the night, away from you and the bucket of emotions you are poised to pour on me.

– Source Unknown

♥♥♥♥♥

Once I stayed a little longer with someone than I should have, not because I was afraid of being alone but because I couldn’t admit to anyone, not even myself, that I made such a poor choice. But alone in the darkness of night, when everything was silent except for that voice in my head, my thoughts berated me incessantly.

Come To My Heart

We’re all just looking for someone to call baby. Someone to feel brave for. Someone to leave the light on for.

My light’s on and somewhere out there is my someone.
Come into my heart space.
Look around. Make yourself at home.

Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song

I am getting good at forgetting you. I have learned to collect all of the scrambling memories I have of you, running around like fluffy little chicks. I scoop them up quickly, stick them in a box and close the lid that throbs like a new bruise.

But every once in a while, a little yellow memory escapes and sneaks its oily way into my conscience, interrupting a once placid moment.

Once, I was in the grocery store — way in the grocery store — far from any exit and easy escape, when I heard the old familiar notes of our song beginning to play on my rustiest heartstring.

As I stood in the cereal aisle with Chex in one hand, Cheerios in the other, I flooded with poultry of what these words once were to me, to us. I recalled the time shopping for towels that our tune played and you wordlessly pulled me in to sway right there among the Egyptian cotton and terrycloth.

How I cherished that moment then. How I am haunted by it now. The lyrics, now so laden with meaning, laughing in my face with irony, make me want to tear open the boxes in my hands and watch the breakfast roll down the manilla tiles of aisle seven.

A life that we once swore was better together is distant. Foreign. Foggy.

I soon realize that I have been deciding for five minutes. I scoop up the chick, tuck it back inside its box and put the cereal back on the shelf. I exit the store leaving my appetite and the memory on the shelf. -Susan

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

I can so relate to what the author is saying. I can never listen to Sheriff’s When I’m With You without thinking of my first love. It’s an old song he found somewhere and he called it our song. I hear it every now and then on my car radio and it instantly transports me back in time, triggering memories of a past love.

Game of Love

The plain truth is that life is a crazy, crazy journey and you just never know where it will lead you. Likewise, people, minds, relationships and lives change every second of every day and sometimes those changes are just too much for the heart to handle. I have learned over the past few months to look at things through kinder eyes and to realise that everything happens for a reason.

A wise friend once told me that love is a crapshoot and a scary game, but one that is too sweet to resist. Each of us can make a choice in life and in love: you can either sit on the sidelines and watch others play the scary and wonderful game of love without you, or you can join in and give it a go. Sure, you’re bound to get scraped, bruised, hurt and damaged, but isn’t the end result worth the risk?

It’s Not Love

“I can’t help it that I don’t feel that way when I look at you. I can’t help it that you do.

From the beginning I knew this was all wrong.
I didn’t feel the ache for you.
Food tasted normal.
Birds sounded the same.
The sky was plain old blue.

But I needed it to be so badly that I kept on, all the while knowing that I would never dream of you or feel that way when I look at you.”

-Source Unknown

We Keep Going

There are a lot of things you’ve been learning about life.

This is what you do, you’re a ball of tape that rolls and bounces and picks it all up as you go, and from time to time you check the adhesive to see what’s on you, how it all adds up. Recent stock-taking would have you happy as you see what’s settled on the surface. Friends. Security. Hope. Your recent liking of avocados. Amazing stuff really.

But sometimes the floor falls out from under you and you are not prepared enough to handle some of what comes your way.

It’s just the way it is. But, you keep going because that’s what you always do and that’s the only choice that you have. 

Ket To My Heart

Do you remember what I was like when we first met? I’d built walls around my heart, gated them, and thrown away the key. I had been hurt, I told you from the beginning. I’d been used, tricked, played with, but most of all, hurt. I thought it best to never fall in love again. So I locked my heart.

You figured it out quite soon. I said don’t fall in love with me. I cannot fall in love with you. I won’t. I’m too hurt, too damaged, and too afraid to go through all of this once more. I’d decided love was just a scam. So we became friends, and that was okay with me, and with you. And it was all nice and comforting and I let myself trust you.

You would listen to me for hours, as we talked about everything and nothing. You learned why I wasn’t willing to let anyone love me, and though you said you would never do that kind of thing to me, I wasn’t ready to trust you to test it out. I kept my walls intact even when I started remembering where I’d thrown the key. It was the only way to keep myself from falling in love.

But then something happened. I woke up weeks later and realised that I loved you. And you said you loved me, and you promised not to hurt me. I believed you. I still didn’t realize how I’d come to love you, how you came to find the key to my heart.

Now I know. You didn’t find the key. You broke into my heart, and I let you.

L-I-F-E

If you have visited here recently you know I went on a three-week vacation to the Western part of Canada. I fell in love with the west, what the locals call Big Sky Country.

I have decided to move West.

Actually, I’ve talked about moving to  a big city since the day I could legally drive. Fate was now directly in my hands, and I could go wherever the road led.

Then things happened. Like school and a career. And life. And so for a variety of reasons, I’ve never left my little province on the East coast.

With everything that has happened in the past year I feel like my life is primed for change. I could just sit here thinking about it for the rest of my life OR I could just get up and do it.

Honestly, I don’t like moving at all. In fact, I hate it. Statistically speaking, moving is one of the most stressful life experiences most people can have, falling somewhere after death and taxes on the list of ‘Things People Really Would Like To Avoid’.

But, here I am, moving to a new Province, on the other side of this vast country, where I really don’t know the area or any of the people except a cousin and a couple of friends. I will be jobless when I arrive and that will certainly add a fair bit of stress.

It’s a scary experience but also exciting too. I read a quote somewhere (where, I am not exactly sure … someone else’s blog? An email? A motivational poster?), it said:

 Adventure is a 4-letter word spelled L-I-F-E.

I am ready for my life’s adventure. I haven’t started packing yet, but I am pretty sure it will be done by the time I have to move all of my stuff.

Western Canada I hear you calling and I am coming to you … are you ready for me?

My Vacation

 

I’m back from three terrific weeks in Western Canada.

On the map I’ve starred the major places I visited although there were many places in between. Starting at the top:

 Fort McMurray

Athabasca

Edmonton

Hinton

Jasper

Lake Louise

Banff

Calgary

Let me tell you if you have never seen the Rocky Mountains it is something you should plan to do at some point in your life. It really makes you feel like a little speck on this planet of ours. The scenery alone makes it worth the drive. The rugged terrain is awe-inspiring and travelling through the Rockies makes for a pretty spectacular trip.

One of my first glimpses of the Rocky Mountains. They are breath-taking!

 View of the Victoria Cross Range from the Upper Summit Station at The Whislters in Jasper, 2277M (6831ft).

Athabasca Galcier, Icefields Parkway between Jasper and Banff. The road through here lies at approximately 2200M (6600ft) and Mt. Athabacsa on the right is 3833M (11,500ft).

You can see the devastion to the lanscapse caused by the weight of the glacier.

I actually stood on the toe of the Athabasca Glacier. I was lucky to witness three avalanches when the 80-100M rim of snow/ice fell about 333M (1000 ft.) I never realised just how loud an avalance is … like a sonic boom.

Sunwapta Falls still not raging with melt water.

Lake Lousie in the center of mountains, all around 3000M (10,000ft). Hard to believe people used to vacation here when there were no cars, just trains & wagons.

I saw so many big horn sheep along the sides of the road and up the hills.  On this trip I also saw a 1 bald eagle, 1 grey wolf, 1 black bear, 1 yellow-headed black bird, several elk, several birds called magpies, several ravens, 1 hawk and several variety of squirrels.

View from The Upper Summit Station, Sulphur Mountain, Banff; located 2281M (7,486ft) above sea level.

This squirrel looks like the chipmunks found in New Brunswick except it is at least twice as big as a chipmunk. He was a friendly little guy, following me around and posing.

These are but a few of my photos and shunk to fit here just doesn’t do any of them justice.

The Heart Grows

“I think your heart grows back bigger, ya know, once you get the shit beat out of you, and the universe lets your heart expand that way ‘cause that’s the function of all this pain and heartache that you go through, and you gotta go through that to come out to a better place.”

– Must Love Dogs 

The Heart Repairs

“Her life was beginning to make sense again, although she couldn’t say she was enjoying it. But her mind was clear, and her heart was not constantly as heavy. Only when she thought about him. But she knew that in time, she’d survive it. She had done it before and would again. Eventually the heart repairs.”

— Emily Griffin 

♥ ♥ ♥ 

It took some time but my heart has healed and the scars have made it stronger. So yeah, my heart is finally okay.