The age of broken hearts

I got a phone call this morning that stopped me in my tracks.  Four of our friends are moving away to Austin, two of the families are friends that have become part of my family, people who have made this journey I'm walking along smoother, brighter.

Kylynn is old enough to understand what is going on by over hearing a conversation, something that I am not fully aware of most of the time.  So immediately after I hung up she asked who was moving to Austin,  I looked at her, told her, and watched it break her heart.

Five year olds spend lots of time whining, being dramatic, and even fake crying to stack the cards in their favor.  This time the tears were genuine and deep, as she curled up into my lap to cry, all my walls around my heart broke down and I felt her pain, which was my pain, and cried along with her.

She cried for a while, talked about how she felt, asked some questions.  And then it hit her, she would draw her friend a picture, a big picture.  Just like that she had moved forward, she was still sad but as they say life must go on, and so it would.  She would take her grief and do something with it, having faith that things will be a little better tomorrow, and the next day, and so on.

So I followed her lead, I cleaned the kitchen while I prayed, and after a while I realized I was praying for the wrong person (namely me) and not the friends who actually needed some prayers right now.  I prayed for them and all that needs to happen for their move, for their pain and sorrow and having to leave their homes, friends, and families.  Soon I felt better, hopeful, seeing the picture much clearer.

I couldn't help but think how this is the first of many broken hearts for my little girl.  This one will not even register on the scale when she looks back at her life.  That it all starts now, the age where friends will not want to play with her, and it will hurt.  Where words will cause pain.  A life lead outside of me, where I will not be able to protect her all the time, where I will not always be able to heal her pain.  I pray that she will never lose that quality of hers, the one that feels pain when it's there, but doesn't allow sorrow to overtake her, instead moves forward, choosing to put her energy into creating beauty.