A calloused Heart

I'm about to be very vulnerable (to quote the illustrious Dave Rhodes)

I'm about to talk about my...feet...Ugh...I think I just threw up a little in my mouth...gross.
My feet are awful...Calloused, rough...awful to touch.  My feet used to be wonderful, in fact someone once told me how nice they were...but that all changed in 2000.  And has continually gotten worse...why then? Well, that is when I was pregnant with Brennan...gained 40+ lbs (which I still have yet to lose, but that's another post) and my feet grew 1/2 size. Swelling, the added weight etc...it took a toll...and then happened again in 2002...and 2005 and 2006.  Yes...pregnancy did this too me. My feet grew a 1/2 size with each child except Millie and my weight went up and down (mostly up). 
So what do I do to my poor feet? IN an effort to lose some of that baby weight I start running...wow, that brought a whole NEW realm of callouses...crazy runners feet.

It's awful, awful I tell you...but you wouldn't know unless you really looked at them...or GASP...tried to touch them (which i wouldn't allow).

So this leads to the thought I had this morning while using my pumice stone in the shower...that is so much the definition of a calloused heart.  When we think of someone with a calloused heart, we think of a bitter old man, hunched over with a permanent scowl on his face, growling and mumbling under his breath...but is that really how it looks.  I mean, how do you know if it's calloused unless you reach out and touch it.
Nails painted, Burts Bees Foot Creme on...you'd never know to look at it.  Only when you touch it do you feel the callouses. 

Realising that whether the callouses came from great struggle and sacrifice(of my own : running or of someone Else's doing : pregnancy) doesn't matter.  It needs to be tended too...only by regular visits for a pedicure (time and money to sacrifice) will the callouses begin to be removed. 

So I ask you (ask "us" really) do you think you have a calloused heart?  When people reach out to touch your heart, do you wince at what they'll find...or even more, not even feel it?  You know they've attempted to touch you, so you respond with a smile, as not to hurt their feelings...but it did nothing for you...too much dead skin between the touch and the nerves...

You may have never considered yourself a calloused person...you don't scowl, you smile...you let people into your life... the "nails are painted" and you even dare to wear flip flops, so people know you're fine with your "feet".

We need to be razored and pumiced and massaged and loved...that is the only way to get rid of callouses and able us to feel.

Time for a pedicure?