Writing sorrow. Picturing those little droplets slipping from eyes, causing embarrassment or joy or shame or release…

I hate crying. I’ve never learned to do it elegantly, with tissue carefully to nose, maybe some slight pinking of same.

Nope. I look like I’ve been dragged down a mountainside backwards and face down after I cry in sorrow. Face red, eyes puffy, headache for days afterwards. It’s not attractive.

Rose-Lynn Fisher: Tears of possibility and hope

But despite myself, I leak tears a lot. They come out when I laugh, whenever my kids do anything at all, pretty well (I still find it miraculous that they breathe, let alone think and argue with me), when I am feeling happy. These tears do have a bit more elegance to them. And now I know why.

They are different, made of different stuff. Check out this photo project by Rose-Lynn Fisher on the Topography of Tears. My favourite is “tears of elation at a liminal moment”, although “tears of possibility and hope” is pretty interesting, too, swirled with new pathways to explore.

Mirabilia.