my careless contagion

  Parker McCollum made a pretty song (with requisite country twang) in Pretty Heart . The last time I heard it, I was getting my hair cut. I have heard it many times, and every time, I think of a particular man and a particular woman, and the things that man should say to that woman. I wished many times he would have turned around, repented of breaking her pretty heart so many ways for so many years, and put their lives back together. I prayed that literally thousands of times. No, that man is not me, though I wish he was because that woman would say yes in an instant if she heard the right words from the right man. I have the words, and he is the man. We just have to put those things together. If I could, I would tear my heart from my chest and replace that man's heart. I would take the words that exist in my mind and put them in his. I would sacrifice myself to put that man and woman back together, if I could. And he would say those precious words and do those necessary things. T...