(Don’t) Cry Over Spilt Paint

After a full day cleaning and painting on a project on one of those hot June days, I arrived home and opened the car door to find that half a 2 litre tin of emulsion had spilled onto the back seat. It had spread over two seats, oozed between them, into the seatbelt mechanism and pooled into the upholstery creases. My car is not new but I do try to keep it as clean and tidy as I can. I just had to walk away, leaving the car door wide open, and into the house where I sat at the kitchen table with my head in my hands. I felt like crying. I took a deep breath and stood to collect all the apparatus for a clean up job. In that moment I felt that I had a choice: do what might be deemed the right and grownup thing (the situation could have been worse) or acknowledge my true feelings and accept them (I felt awful). I was disappointed, tired and fed up. And I felt like crying. So I did. Full blown ugly crying with a screwed up face and just a little wailing.

At that point my son arrived home. He looked horrified. I knew I had to convey quickly that no-one had died, our world was not falling apart. As he hugged me and patted my back, all I could manage was, “…spilled paint. In the c-c-car…” There was no judgement from him, no words to dismiss my emotional outpouring. He just let me get the tears and mascara all over the shoulder of his shirt.

We talked about it a few days later and had a chuckle about it. I’m thankful he just let me be true to myself. The car back seat is never going to be the same of course but neither am I. My heart was broken, although in such a small way, but was mended oh so quickly. By allowing my emotions to unashamedly flow through me, feeling them and giving them a name, they passed and I am left only with the memory and the lesson.  Practicing with the small stuff can help me when the big stuff comes along. And I will never put a tin of paint on the back seat again, whatever the circumstances!