what you don't see

pictures are bizarre to me.  i almost think we were better off before social media started documenting everything.  it's hard to move on when you are so firmly rooted in the past.  

it is difficult for me at times.  we used to have family pictures taken every fall and then send out christmas cards.  i had planned on framing my christmas cards throughout the years.  planned on documenting in a firm and unmoving way, how our family and grown and changed.  i didn't see these changes coming though.  and it hurts to know there will always be people missing and it hurts to think that some people will look at future cards and see a replacement.

the truth is, that when you find love again, it doesn't fill those spots that the person before filled.  the space in my heart that jim loved was and is reserved only for him.  i will never again have those spaces filled.  our brains so often want to make sense and normalize it and so we look at things as substitutions, but it's not the case.  the difficult thing is, when you love and lose and love again, your heart has to swell, has to break open, has to create new space to be known, to be accepted, to be loved.  

being loved again does not replace my husband.  but i am thankful for a heart that has found itself big enough to swell.  i am thankful for a heart that has created more space.  for a heart that has said, "yes, i got hurt, yes i wanted to shrink, but i won't, i will fight through and i will love you too"  because the most profound beauty in life comes from love and i am so so so thankful to be granted the most insane beauty i have ever experienced in five different ways.  

a broken heart has created the most fertile and open ground for love to grow, and i remain thankful.