CRYING TIME CAN BE ANY TIME

Crying time in my family is . . . complicated.

Not one gets called a cry baby, made fun of, or ignored.

But there’s a thought that some of us aren’t fans of a good cry.

And they’re wrong.

The problem is context.

What are the right conditions for a good cry.

It could be hurtful, happy, a surprise, a shock.

It’s when something happens and you feel something coming on, like tears, and you look around.

If we can dance like no one is watching, which happened last night when one person started to dance, then another, then another without a care, what’s the problem?

I was one of them when I broke out my eighth grade sway, the same back and forth standard I displayed at the 50th high school reunion. (Hey Jeannie)

Dance, laugh, cry like no one is watching, and so what if they are?

When is the last time you let it out, when your feelings welled up and poured out?

Maybe it’s complicated? Maybe not.

Was it because of something someone did?

When a jackass does jackass things, and you cry, it might be time to un-jackass on those jackass things.

A driver cuts you off in traffic, or honks their horn and you know it’s at you; when someone cuts in line ahead of you and you’ve been waiting an hour already; if someone knocks on your door ignoring the no solicitor sign.

Cry worthy? If it is for anything, it’s worthy.

 

Crying Problems Happen

If crying time happens when you’re with someone, they might think it’s their fault.

Even if you’re walking along and a sad memory occurs to you and you wipe a tear away, your companion may take the blame.

Then you’re stuck trying to reassure them while you work through your moment of sadness.

There you are snuffling out those reassurances and they start crying too?

Figure this out: You’re crying over a sad moment you happen to remember at an awkward moment, and your crying makes someone cry.

Complicated?

 

I’ve never cried more than I did when my kids were born.

Since they were born at home, it was a home cry and it went on and on.

I had a gusher, a geyser, a firehose running out of both eyes until I could barely see.

A few years back I had cataract surgery, an eye patch slipped, and my vision was twisted and turned.

I could see better then than I could through the tsunami of tears.

Maybe I could have stopped? Why? Not when things were rolling, mother and baby were fine.

I was a mess and kind of liked the freedom of the feeling of a new born, then a second born.

Those kids were getting a better world, or they would make a better world themselves.

My wife liked having two sons the way Princess Diana had two sons and joined in on everything.

We cried tears of happiness together as they grew up.

High school graduation? Pass me a hankie.

Driving home from dropping them at their dorms? Where’s my paper towel.

When they married the best girls imaginable? I cried the happiest of all tears.

Grandbabies? Maybe those are the happiest of tears.

 

A Harsh Cry

This is the famous crying Frenchman with tears of despair upon learning the Germans have taken France.

Twenty years earlier his country had been ransacked by Germany in WWI.

Now he was looking down the barrel of WWII.

Both sides used gas against combatants the first time around; one side used gas against noncombatants the second time.

The Holocaust showed mans complete disregard for life in the death camps; the firebombed cites, the cites crushed by artillery, showed the human evolution of uncivilized industrialism.

Like Robert Graves WWI autobiography, ‘Goodbye To All That,‘ this crying man was a symbol of Europe as the war erased more than countries. Again.

 

Written after the war and as he was leaving his birthplace, he thought, forever, Good-Bye to All That bids farewell not only to England and his English family and friends, but also to a way of life.

 

Even in my time we’ve cried for our country.

This is the fallen President’s family at his funeral where JFK was laid to rest with an eternal flame.

That’s Bobby who was laid to rest behind his brother’s grave five years later.

A decade that began with promise and hope was awash in grief from the events of November 22, 

It’s a day that still echoes in the halls of history.

For one family with crying time for many members, that day was a crying time for us all.

 

When It’s Your Crying Time

You don’t need to put on a happy face, hide away, or pretend everything is fine, all fine.

That kind of behavior leads to problems no one wants.

Stifle your emotions and you might find yourself with Broken Heart Syndrome.

 

After one of the best weekends imaginable, including a farewell, family, and the embrace of loved ones, I remember thinking: “Now I can die happy.”

It’s a common saying heard from healthy people and it’s funny. I’ve said it before and it felt funny. Not so much this time.

It was a funny twinge in my chest, which is no surprise. Last week I put up 225 lbs on the bench press. That’ll twinge a few things if you’re not ready. In other words I lift weights, I’m a weight lifter, and there’s always a twinge, a cramp, a spasm, a pull, or a tear.

Cranking through planned resistance training everyday is a key to staying young, or at least vital. One point is bragging rights:

“Did you lift today?”

“Yes, I lifted. And here’s what I did,” followed by listing sets and reps, the sort of conversation people hear too often and quit public gyms. Gym Rat talk.

Except I didn’t lift Friday or Saturday.

A slight twinge Saturday night, more twinge Sunday morning, then the finale on Monday morning. Time to book a room at the heartbreak hotel.

“Honey, I need to get checked out.”

“Then let’s go.”

 

Cry whether anyone is watching or not because when you’re gone you won’t be watching anyone crying for you.

And there will be plenty of tears, trust me on this.

Even the worst of people have had someone cry for them, and you are, by the fact you’re reading this, not in that league.

If you seen a movie with a emotional scene that made you think, ‘I’ve done that,’ then you won’t be surprised when an event in real life makes you think of that movie.

Even if the movie is ‘This Is The End.’

 

In Hollywood, actor James Franco is throwing a party with a slew of celebrity pals. Among those in attendance are his buddies Jonah Hill, Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel, Danny McBride and Craig Robinson.

Suddenly, an apocalypse of biblical proportions erupts, causing untold carnage among Tinseltown’s elite and trapping Franco’s party in his home.

As the world they knew disintegrates outside, cabin fever and dwindling supplies threaten to tear the six friends apart.

 

When someone is sad, be a comfort.

If they cry in front of you, cry along.

Then, after you decide enough time has passed, a minute, an hour, a day, a decade, a lifetime, pick up as many pieces as you can and rebuild from the inside out.

What? Again?

Yes, again, because that’s who we are, who we want to be, who we want others to be.

Strong, reliable, willing and ready.