*on not wasting the sweetness

Posted by meli on Wednesday, October 19, 2011 in inspired, marriage | No comments

a tree at the apple farm we recently visited

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”
~ Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum

I read this passage on a lovely blog I frequent, and it moved me so much. Actually, I think that's the exact line she used when sharing this, too. There's really no other way I would describe it. Moving. The things going on in my life right now are pretty heavy. Broken, betrayed, left, hurt, and even death in a sense - all so near to me right now. It would be easy to throw up walls and close myself off, but I don't. I wont. This thing called life is so very short; I'm not about to waste the sweetness.