They come, just like the ubiquitous hot flashes of middle age springing out of nowhere. They are as unexpected as the minutes of intense heat- rising and burning away the dross of guilt, regret, mistakes made during the childbearing years. They come without warning and can be triggered by anything, a song, a poem, a sunrise, a fading photograph. It happens when I least expect it, escaping one drop at a time. I don’t sob, my face doesn’t get red, there is no tell-tale noise, no runny nose. Most often no one even sees them, they are quickly wiped away. What I can’t seem to do is stop them or predict them. They just happen. One teardrop at a time, rising not from my body but from my soul. A tiny drop of salty water escaping from my heart. Sometimes, it is so full of pain,  my being simply cannot hold it inside anymore and it must be absorbed by the universe. At other times, it contains a drop of joy that falls in gratitude upon the ground. Most often, it is a drop of love mixed with a memory or a hope. It is the only form of prayer I know these days. It pleads for nothing, it doesn’t pretend to know anything, it just is. It trusts, it accepts, it let’s go and it falls to the ground, leaving an almost imperceptible trail on the path where I have walked. Perhaps, like the small droplet of rain falling high in the mountains, these soul drops will gather with those shed by others, forming a small stream and then a great river until they are combined in some mysterious ocean to wrap us in the love that will one day welcome us all back home. Perhaps, as we die we will smell the salt water, run into an ocean of love that we have helped create and realize that this has been the meaning of our lives. Perhaps.