I am trying to remember what my therapist recently said about anger.

Damn it, therapy ain't cheap, and it certainly is a time commitment. I need to remember the things she says that strike a chord.

It was something about anger being a choice ... yada, yada, yada .... OK, so I definitely should be taking notes. But perhaps the gist of it was that even though we all are entitled to our feelings, and we certainly are entitled to feelings of anger when we have reason to be ticked off, the way we handle our anger is all about choices.

My anger has gotten me in some trouble this past year.

I had some mighty fine reasons to be angry.

Things were crumbling before my eyes.

I felt alone, and I felt very, very scared.

I wanted to fix things; I wanted to repair. But I felt as if my hands were bound and someone kept hiding all the tools ... or even throwing the nails back at me.

And Lord knows I sometimes swung the hammer a bit hard.

I looked for help from sources who turned out to be incapable of providing it.

I was shocked to learn that sometimes people can see someone at their weakest moments, at their most fearful ... and jump at the chance to make it worse.

Sometimes a wagging finger hurts much worse than a balled-up fist.

And what do you do with anger when, at some point -- some horrible moment that will stay with you for the rest of your life -- things seems completely irreparable?

Oh, holy heck, I am still working on that.

I am getting better at it. But I have a ways to go.

Most of all, I wish, with all my heart, that I knew how to heal the hurt that lies below the surface -- that lies below the anger.

I wish I could do that for myself ....

And for others, too.