Cry

In Japan, you can hire a handsome guy to cry with you—he'll offer
Kleenex, wipe your tears, lay his head on the table beside yours.

In the office conference room, you and your colleagues are sobbing
at the end a short film about a father who can't be with his dying

daughter because she doesn't know who he is. There's something about
crying or allowing yourself to be seen like this in public. In my hometown, 

you can hire rofessional mourners who'll come and sit in a row at the wake 
of your loved ones, tear their clothing or beat their breasts as they start 

the public grieving. How are they so easily and literally moved to tears? 
Barely three months since my mother's death, and I don't feel like I've really 

cried yet. Sometimes my cheeks are wet when I'm behind the wheel and paused 
at a traffic light, or when my husband wakes me in the middle of a wrenching 

dream. Sometimes it's hard to give ourselves permission to be vulnerable until 
reminded of how even the beautiful ones feel the pain of trying to endure.