Big Girls Don't Cry...

Well, sometime they do, along with big boys. The truth is, some people, boys and girls, big and small, old and young, easily cry. Some do not.

If you easily cry, it is totally beyond your control. You hear a patriotic song; you spot a disabled veteran; you watch a wedding as people make vows they, and you, hope will hold a lifetime; the accomplishment of a child; a random act of kindness... your eyes suddenly burn and tears well. You dare not speak, knowing a choke, a sob, or some other involuntary sound will come from your throat and reveal your emotional overload. They will wonder.

Elvis Presley once recorded a song titled "I Was The One". He sang, the sight of her tears drives you out of your mind. As a matter of fact, the sight of tears drives a lot of people out of their mind, and not in an empathetic way. People who do not cry look at people who do cry as weak, or worse. At best, they turn their eyes away. Sometimes they make a remark that hurts.

A senior friend once admitted that he cried at the drop of a hat. That made me think that crying easily was just another unpleasant side effect of aging. As though, by the time you are old, your nerves have been rubbed so raw, your emotions easily erupt in tears. Then, I see younger people cry... at times when they should not!

So, it remains that some big girls, and others, do cry, whether they like it or not. I've noticed that if a person has a visible disability, like a limp, people sympathize. If the disability is not so visible, as in the case of mental disability, people just dismiss you as stupid. Crying, involuntarily, is visible. But don't expect sympathy.