You know, I have a theory about injury and healing. It’s just anecdotal, from my own personal experience with trauma – which, granted, is nothing measured against your own. In my opinion, souls are no different than limbs. If you break a leg or an arm, it’s going to hurt when it happens, sharply and unbearably. Therapy is like what you do to set the bones properly in a cast and monitor its mending. It’s the physical rehab, the stretching, the follow up x-rays. But the limb is never the same. On rainy days, the joint aches. If you run a marathon on it, it will be sore. Maybe the healed part isn’t quite right. Souls are the same. There are different marathons we run, whether it’s the day-to-day interactions with our spouses or the people we work with. Maybe it’s an event like Balthazar getting hurt. Perhaps it’s an anniversary of a bad night or even a good one, like a holiday or a birthday. These are the marathons our souls run, and sometimes, where we have healed aches. Or worse. And that is nonnegotiable part of being a survivor.
A warm heart in winter by J. R. Ward
farkleberry 