picture in my mind

I didn't know why I was going to cry, but I knew that if anybody spoke to me or looked at me too closely the tears would fly out of my eyes and the sobs would fly out of my throat and I'd cry for a week. I could feel the tears brimming and sloshing like water in a glass that is unsteady and too full.

~ The Bell Jar by Slyvia Plath

This rings a bell, because my gosh, there was a time when I felt like this -- maybe not quite as extreme. But bad enough that I felt if anyone were to talk to me properly, to ask earnestly and sincerely, Hey, are you happy?, I would have burst into tears without so much as a pause or a warning. The description of a glass of tears full to the brim is just so apt. When you have bottled up so much, that's how it gets. And it's not about one thing or even several things, it's this inexplicable, unexplainable accumulation of hurt that seemed to have no beginning; like it had always been there, and then it had become too much to ignore.

And I have never been more grateful than anything in my life than to have overcome this. And in a way, I'm also grateful I actually went through all that depressed crap; because it has, I like to think, made me wiser and stronger; that now, I can actually talk about it. :) I remember a conversation I had with duckie long ago, when I said how life seems to be a long series of valleys with only a couple of peaks that come far in between. And she was like, Shouldn't it be the other way round!!! More peaks, fewer valleys! Now, I don't even care, haha. It's not about the peaks and valleys; it's that I can smile no matter what. Sometimes, when I see people being sad, I want to say GANBATTE! -- you can do it too. Don't give up like Sylvia Plath, who stuffed herself in an oven and died. What a waste of an intelligent woman.

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Today, I drove to sayyidat liqa' and back!!! :DDD My brother was all, Just drive lah! So I did, and it was okay, although my sis really had to direct me because I am just totally, totally bad at directions. Then we had waqfa ma'an nafs (i.e. Reflecting on ourselves), and Mami Bee gave me a shoulder massage! Awesomeness. And halfway through I just felt truly happy and fuzzy inside because I don't know how many of us realise how special it is that we get to do this -- sit around every other week, being together, learning, talking and loving each other, just for Allah and Rasul's sake. It's the little things about the usrah, really the little things, that affirm my heart in this.