Spillin my guts to an officer

I realized it had been a while since I spilled my guts, buckled down and just had a good hard crying confession.

I realized this on the side of the road in Salt Lake City, while a cop was asking for my license and registration. A tear dropped. It was a well deserved tear because I'd never received a ticket before. I initially had no idea why he was pulling me over.

Then it all became too embarrassing. While he was talking to me, the tears started flowing, then came choked sobbing and I found myself wanting to take that officer by the shoulders, shake him and tell him all the hardships in my life, all the things that escalated to my forgetting the speed limit. And the story would've been a long one, it would've been my life story.

What did I learn from this? The speeding ticket didn't affect me. It was justified by good reasons that I feel no need to explain here. What I really learned from this situation actually has nothing to do with cops or speeding tickets or driving.

Crying. I don't cry. I never cry. I go for years at a time without crying. But there's a distinct problem with not crying. My tear ducts are full. They're full to bursting. I go for such a long time without letting that emotional part of me have release and then I find myself on the side of the road sobbing.

I've put off crying the past few years. I know its not a weakness but its something I recognize as an occasional incident. Its part pride and not. I don't like to cry a lot because then people will never recognize when I am truly upset. After I fell on my blades and hit my head on the concrete my roommates knew I needed to go the emergency room. Why? Because there were silent tears running down my cheeks.

I didn't cry when my heart was broken. He wasn't worth something so special. I cried when a dear friend from the ward died. I cried at 16 when I almost killed my family in an accident. I stopped crying consistently after my first day of high school. I cried then because I was frustrated with myself. I didn't have friends, I didn't understand my homework, I was scared. Everyone knew the routine because they were in their sophomore year, I was in my sophomore year and thats when I started high school. Before that I had home schooled for three years and I was scared to do anything by myself.

I hate my weaknesses, I hate things about myself. So what do I do? I fix them. I hated that crying meant I was acknowledging my weaknesses, giving in. I don't give in. So I stopped. In the past 6 years I can count on one hand all the times I've cried. It hasn't been easy. There have been times when I wanted to just lay in bed at night and cry. I didn't.

Maybe I should've though. Then I wouldn't burst into tears when I get pulled over.