This Christmas Eve night we drove past a parking lot on our way to see Christmas lights with the kids.
It was a parking lot where, just three years prior this very month, I had hastily transferred my children, under cover of darkness, to a waiting vehicle to ferry them two hours away to my inlaws. Removing all loved ones from the Fourth Circle of Hell.
I then drove in the opposite direction for my own two hours to a waiting airplane. I flew cross-country to my husband to attempt to save my marriage, as I witnessed his affair unfold via email & Blackberry. And had no damned idea what the hell I was doing, what I would say, how I could single-handedly stop time.
So, a mere four nights ago, I once again looked out into that parking lot as it passed by on my right, and felt such compassion for the poor girl who was in a blind panic and was attempting to regain any semblance of control of her life.
I just wanted to pull into the past and climb out of my car and hug her. Tell her she couldn't get control of this. Tell her what not to do in the next three years. Tell her how to handle what was coming.
I cannot begin to explain how overcome I was in that moment; looking into the darkness and having a truly tender love for my three-year-ago self ... and the world she was about to walk through.
