Tuesday, May 19, 2009

You've got to have heart

A dear friend of mine calls me the Tin Woman.  This friend and I talk about everything and anything.  We laugh together, bitch together and cry together.  It is the crying the has turned me into the Tin Woman.  I am always told that if I cry, I will rust.  (of course, the same can be said about going out in the rain!) My response is always  "I lost my oilcan...have you seen it."  One special thing about this friend, is that this friend is one of my Very Best Friends, and like with all VBFs, this friend owns a peice of my heart.

As the Tin Woman, can this be so? Can I dole out pieces of my heart to other people? Did the Tin Man have a heart?  What do hearts feel? Can they feel? These are my deep thoughts for the day!

The Tin Man in The Wizard of OZ thought he didn't have a heart. He thought that he was heartless. I'm sure that at times many of us, like the Tinman, have felt heartless. Maybe you said no one too many times to your child, or didn't want to deal with your friend because you just wanted to be left alone, or you cut someone off just to be nasty.  No reason.. you just felt heartless.  But the truth is, you weren't heartless, you were just being human. And you probably eneded up feeling bad about your actions later anyway.  No one is truly heartless. The Tinman thought he was heartless, and wished so badly for a heart, yet if you look at his actions to help Dorothy, it shows that he not only had a heart, but he had heart...miles and miles of heart. He helped defeat the Wicked Witch...and melt her, fought against her Flying Monkeys, to save Dorothy. I don't know what you think, but I think that takes heart.  I know I wouldn't want to take on Flying Monkeys! (I do know that there is a little bit of Wicked Witch in all of us!)

Then there is the broken heart. Now that we know the Tin Man had a heart, let's talk about broken hearts. Have you ever had a broken heart? Did you know that you can actually feel your heart break, feel it tear in two. You can even feel the tear grow  bigger. This doesn't just happen when someone you love hurts you, it can also happens when someone you love is hurting. There is an actual phsical pain that you feel where your heart is when when your heart is breaking.  It is one of the worst types of pain I have ever felt.  Noboby I love, my friends or my family should ever have to feel pain.  Or the pain of a broken heart.  Of course, a broken heart causes tears, and tears of course, can cause the Tin Woman to rust! (Oil Can ???)

How about a Heart Full of Joy?  I'm sure we've all felt that!  At our weddings, our graduations, when our children were born, when our children have reached major milestones, or performed at concerts or at sports to their full potential.  This too can be a physical feeling, like butterflies in your stomach, only closer to where your heart is.  How can anyone complain about life when they have a heart full of joy? (and yes, this too can cause the Tin Woman to cry!)

And then there is the ultimate...Love.  This is what the heart was designed for. What can I say about love.  We have all felt it in some way or another.  For our parents, our siblings, other family members, our significant others, our kids, our friends.   When I mentioned the feeling of butterflies in your stomach before, that was nothing compared to the feeling of a heart that is full of love.  That is like flying thru the sky on your own set of wings.  A wonderful flight that you never want to end. Feeling love can also cause heartache too, but we must try to look past that heartache toward the joy and happiness that love brings us.  Love is the ultimate feeling that the Tinman never thought he would feel until he met Dorothy. (Sniff, sniff, rust, rust.)

So what have I been trying to say here?  I guess what I'm saying is that we all have a heart and have heart, and the wonderful and sometimes not so wonderful feeings that having a heart gives us.  I'm sure there are times we wish we didn't have a heart, so we didn't have to feel, but these feelings are what make us special and who we are.  The Tinman was never without a heart...it was always there, he just didn't know how to use it.  You all know how to use your hearts. Use them well, and for the better.  Use them to love your family and your friends. That is what I use mine for.  And yes, as the Tin Woman, even I can dole peices of my heart out to those that I love.  In fact there are certain readers out there who own pieces of my heart, and you all know who you are!  So now that I am done writing, I am off to find my oil can, becuase this deep thought is making me rust!




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