I tried to hold back the cloth of tears that has formed already in my damp eyes but hardly had I turned away from her when fresh balls of tears began to cascade freely down my eyes like a waterfall. I have often heard my father say that it is unmanly to shed tears but I have since realised that it is therapeutic. Every man has a child in him who sometimes takes over his emotion. As it were, the child in me who could not be suppressed in moments as this suddenly took over my emotions and I had to let those prisoned pains out as torrents of rain. For beyond the teachings of religion and philosophy, I have suddenly realised that there is more to life than books can teach. Life presents a whole lot of experience which cannot be taught enough in volumes of books or walls of classrooms. It also leaves us with a lot of questions to ponder.
No sooner had I walked some distance away from her when I was arrested by the greatest police of modernisation,REALITY! I stood transfixed to a spot within the international airport departure lounge with balls of tears forming a ring on my brow. I turned to take one final look at my love but she was gone!
Gripped with this realisation, I felt like a child tearing away from the mother for the very first time. I looked around to be sure no one was watching but was disappointed to find several heads turned towards my direction. They feasted their burning eyes on me from different angles waiting for that moment of catharsis - the moment when pains are released as torrents of rains, cascading down the slope of a gloomy eye and the hollows of a heavy heart. Realising this, I quickly put my emotions to check and headed straight for the exit as fresh tears began to form a cloud around my soggy eyes.
I waved down a taxi and sank at the back seat like a bag of rice, with endless thoughts swarming like bees in my head. Why does love hurt this much? How could I face the sombre music of loneliness when she has showned me the tranquility that true and unadulterated love commands? How do I start learning to do alone those things that we used to do together? How can I live with the naked reality that I am now alone and my lover is gone? Why does love hurt this much?
So many of us have found ourselves in a position where we have had to ask why. For some of us, it could be a temporary separation imposed by long distance relationship or other possible human or psychological factors and for others, it could be a permanent separation which can either be as a result of a broken relationship or death. Whichever way one looks at it, separation either temporary or permanent does not always go down well with the major players who are usually the most affected. Suffice to say that the enterprise of love justifies the age-long saying, “there is no gain without pain.” For some, love comes with gains in abundance and for others, the pains last longer than those elusive moments of pleasure.
However, there is hardly any love enterprise that does not have its dark clouds, notwithstanding the silver linning. Such dark clouds are reflected in the pains, hurts, self-denials and sacrifices we have made in the past which to a large extent are the emblems of our commitment to such a noble cause as love. The realisation that such sacrifices and self-denials have only been a waste of time and resources and could have been invested in a more worthy enterprise is the major source of the emotional trauma that characterises a typical break up. Feelings of insecurity in long distant relationships are product of constantly dwelling on the pains and difficulties of the past, which in most cases, blurs the individuals from seeing the gains and the possibility of of a better tomorrow. To live with the mind-set that love hurts but the gains are more than the pains is noble, hence to love someone truly is a noble act and to be loved sincerely is a rare privilege. This is why many go through life searching for true love but only a few truly finds it.
The business of love is transacted in a very sensitive quatre –the heart. The individuals are usually not strange to the clime as they must have trod this path before. However, rather than transact such sensitive business with an open heart and with the benefit of the intellect, they would rather disengage the intellect at such crucial moments and allow the heart undertake such a delicate task with all its vulnerability hence, the reason most relationship do not always work! Let the heart love but let the head lead. For it is wisdom to balance your emotions with logic.
At this point, my phone rang and I was jolted back to reality. The comforting voice of my mother could be heard from the other end of the line.
“Son are you alright? You don’t sound like you. Is there something you would want to share with me my dear?” She queried in her usual motherly manner.
I told her I was alright but deep down, I know that it would take bridging the distance between my lover and I, for me to be happy again. Something about mothers, they can always feel the pains of their children from afar. Call it motherly instinct or what you will but, mothers are emotional attached to their children and somehow they can feel their pains. Now I have an issue at hand! How am I going to put up a happy face so as not to trouble my mother’s emotion when my heart hurts with the pain of being separated from the woman I truly love? It appears I have finally gotten myself into an emotional fix – the love of a mother and that of a wife!
I had my eyes fixed on her picture when fatigue took its toll on me and I ascended gradually into the other phase of man’s existence – a temporary state of rest! Maybe, I might find an isle to nest. But wait a minuite! Will this pain ever cease to be when the morning comes? Will I find her here in the morning? Will I?
