A Bottle of Hot Sauce and a Broken Heart

I am looking for spaghetti sauce.  How innocent is that?  The recipe calls for spaghetti sauce, and although I rarely serve spaghetti, there is usually a bottle in the back of the pantry.  The pantry is rather unorganized so I am moving bottles and cans around the shelves with my eye out for the sought-after spaghetti sauce.  My hand nearly knocks a slim bottle off the shelf.  As I steady it, I see that it is Tapatio hot sauce.  And my heart drops to my stomach.  Or at least it feels that way.

Since my boys grew up and moved away, we don’t keep this kind of hot sauce in the house.  Their younger sisters had no use for it.  After all, as I told my sons, “that stuff will put hair on your chests!”.   What girl wants that?  I was joking, of course, but it made them laugh.  And a mom will do a lot to get laughter out of their teenager.  But here sits a bottle of hot sauce.  And tears well up in my eyes.

Oh my heck, this is so silly.  Who cries over a bottle of hot sauce?  I thought I was over this.  I thought WE were over this.  I have to remind myself that it’s WE.  Not just me.  In fact, it’s more HER than me.  My amazingly talented and beautiful daughter.  And if I’m honest, I know she’s not over it.  Yet.  And because she is not over it, neither am I.  What loving and dedicated Mom would be over something that her child is still hurting over?  We hurt when they hurt, right?


So, what does a bottle of hot sauce have to do with a broken heart?  I’ll tell you, but first, let me tell you about this daughter.  She is beautiful, inside as well as outside.  She is tallish, slender, with long honey-colored hair, clear blue eyes and a sprinkle of freckles.  She is so accomplished it makes my head spin.  She sings, plays the piano, the ukulele, and the saxophone.  Valedictorian in High School, she has also graduated from BYU with a degree in Exercise Science.  She is an amazing athlete, from soccer to track and ultimate frisbee.  She can keep up with the guys in this department.  She hikes, climbs, rappels, and is a fan of the outdoors.  She’s a talented amateur photographer, genealogist, and cartoonist.  She has served an 18 month mission in Russia as an ambassador for the Gospel she loves.
 She’s a great lover of animals and small children, and they love her back.  She knows how to save and manage money.  She has fearlessly traveled around Europe, on her own and with only a backpack.  Add to all that, she is tender and kind-hearted and doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.  Well, maybe a small splinter of mischievousness  when it comes to playing a trick on her mean big brother when she was young.

She has also been un-lucky in love.   What the heck is wrong with guys nowadays?   I could really go off on this one, but I’ll save that for another post.  The list will be long.

Hot sauce?  Oh yeah, I got carried away.   Actually, I really can’t go into the details.  My daughter would feel betrayed.  REALLY mad at me.  But I bought that hot sauce for a guy she was seeing, because he liked it on his eggs.  And he was over A LOT.  That’s it.  And then he broke her heart.  Before I even opened the bottle.  I know she will get over it, but it takes time and she still hurts.  Feels betrayed.  Feels discarded.  Feels unwanted.  And this stupid bottle of Tapatio hot sauce just reminded me of all of this.  Again.  

Hot sauce.  It burns.  And sometimes, so does love.