Where do broken hearts go?

The LHC abhors Valentine’s Day. It is that one time of the year when people from all walks of life get bitten by the love bug to sweetly surrender (for a day at least) into his soupiest, cheesiest best; that time of the year when (listen up, boys and men) it will actually matter to your better half that you hold her hand at least once during the course of the day. For members of the Lonely Hearts Club though, the day is nothing short of a neon sign that reminds them that, yes, there just isn’t that special someone to celebrate the love with.

This piece is actually dedicated to them. All too often, the papers will be teeming with wonderful ideas to do and say to your loved one, all claiming to guarantee palpitations and squeals of delight. There is nothing wrong with that. If everyone could just be as happy the world will be a much better place to live in, right? But broken hearts are as much a reality as happy hearts. Where do they go on Valentine’s Day?

Why is it that when a relationship falls apart it almost always comes easier for one to dwell on the pain than to simply move on without looking back? Despite your strongest resolve and best effort to react positively about the whole thing (read: sincerely wishing your ex well, not hating his/her new love, not hoping against hope that he/she will come running back to you) processing will take a painful time. Breaking up is never an easy thing to do – it doesn’t matter who initiated it. The sting will be there.

I was just talking to a friend of mine who, unless the winds change by next week, will most likely be spending V-day by his lonesome – a by-product of a just very recently broken heart. Prospects are swarming around him but he only wants one–the one who got away.

What is a day in his life like? He wakes up to a perfectly good day after a night of deep soul-searching where he has DECIDED to finally let go and not dwell on the past. He reaches for his phone and his heart skips: 1 message received. Hope. With bated breath he opens the message "Si Vilma Santos ba ay isa sa mga gumanap bilang Darna? Text ur answer and win a free drink at..." Dashed hopes. Oh well. There’s nothing wrong with hoping for the usual good morning message from her, right? After all, you both decided to stay friends.

He goes through the usual day, bugged by the memory of what used to be but could no longer be. I will survive, he says. He turns on the radio to make the silence bearable and sings along. "Spread your wings and prepare to fly, you have become a butterfly." (Yeah, if you love someone set her free, that was a good thing to do.) The next song comes in, "We had the right love at the wrong time...Somewhere down the road...You belong to me..." (Oh dear, maybe she does belong to me)...And then the next," I will love you till they take my heart away... (that’s it, that used to be our song)." He turned the radio with every intention of forgetting, only to end up being constantly reminded of the very person he wants to forget. Stay on track, stay on track, he says to himself over and over again.

He has decided to call in sick to work so while he’s home, he might as well be productive, right? I’ll sort out my stuff, he thinks and proceeds to his bedside table. Everything seems to be going well when from beneath a pile of books and CDs his fingers find two used movie tickets. The pain hits home again. And to think he was so sure he kept everything that reminded him of her in a duffel bag stuffed at the back of his closet. Out of sight, out of mind, right? He calls some friends and drives off in his car to watch a movie with them. He turns to the empty seat beside him and sees in a sad heap the jacket she gave him two Christmases ago. All of a sudden he can again faintly smell her perfume. And if that were not enough, he walks through a strip of Greenbelt 3 only to have each corner, each nook bring back a memory. As fate would have it, the very movie he chose to watch is the same movie she is watching, only this time she is with someone else. And the nerve of her to actually stay in our favorite seats, he thinks. How could she? What does that mean? Will she remember that that place used to be ours? Or is she not totally over me as well that’s why she chose to stay there too? And why is she still wearing the watch I gave her? Do we still have a chance? What could that mean?

Actually, it doesn’t have to mean anything. Really. But that’s it. That’s what really sucks. The routine, the familiarity. When we fall in love we attach circumstances, songs, places and things to the person we love, stamping it as ours alone. In our mind, these things are patented. The favorite spot in the favorite restaurant, your theme song, the little pasalubong that’s always the same, your favorite ritual at day’s end, even the term of endearment. It exists especially for both of you. Only.

I had a classmate in college who got all worked up because she heard her ex call his new girlfriend "babes." "Babes!" she said indignantly. "How dare he call her that! I was ‘babes,’ why can’t he just call her honey, love, or sweetheart. Anything but ‘babes’! ‘Babes’ is me, it should only be me," she said near tears already. I looked at her helplessly. What can I say to that? How could I have explained to her, in her emotional state, that terms of endearment cannot be patented? After all, "babes" is just as common as "I love you," right? It cannot be said to just one person in a world of millions. It is yours to have for as long as it is given to you.

Don’t sweat the small stuff, they always say. But it will take a broken heart to know that the little things that made you swoon when love was still there are the very same things that will eat you up when it’s gone, putting a foil on the baby steps you took at moving forward. It is the security and joy of knowing you have someone special, the intermittent phone calls during the day, that hand to hold whenever you want to, the hug to have when you need it most. It’s not about the big things but, yes, it’s all about the small, seemingly mundane ones.

So where do broken hearts go? Nowhere actually, they stay where they are until you do something about them. You deal with the pain in your own terms, taking it a day at a time. No grandiose plans of casting him into oblivion in exactly two days, three weeks, or 14 months. The heart just stays broken until acceptance heals the wound. After all, just as you were entitled to enjoy while it was there, you are also entitled to miss it when it’s gone.

But healing happens faster when you come to terms with the fact that happiness is yours alone. You cannot make someone else responsible for it. You have to take charge of your own destiny.

Loving someone is doing so without expecting the exact same level of love to be given back to you. Easier said than done, right? But think of it this way. If you’re truly, truly happy from within, every other good thing that comes along is just icing on the cake, date or no date on Valentine’s Day (and every other day as well).