A friend was telling me yesterday how her young son had broken a cup from her prized crockery set. She was very upset by this and had scolded him rigorously for showing no respect to her by breaking it and then trying to cover it up by shifting the blame on his sibling.
‘You should have seen the way he tried to sweep it up and put it in the bin before I came along and caught him,’ she related.
She was in tears as she went over and showed me the remaining items minus the now broken cup.
‘Just the one cup broke?’ I asked to which she nodded sadly. ‘I know it is difficult as you loved this set a lot, but since when was there a guarantee that anything will last forever?’ I said.
We always seem to get upset at the breakage of delicate items that were created to be broken and were never promised to be immune to being broken, the heart for example. No matter how much we protect ourselves, one day it will break and sometimes, it carries on breaking again and again until we decide no more. And when we have decided no more, sometimes it carries on breaking regardless. Unfortunately though, as with a broken cup or glass, we are unable to sweep away the pieces but instead often end up carrying them deep within us, for them to pierce our souls now and again.
