Impetus

Not to be prosaic, but a conversation with a friend got me thinking about things... and there's a thunderstorm outside - its a good time to ruminate. It's hard for anyone to play the 'what if' game and to grasp how truly different life would be had we done some things differently. Forgone opportunities, friends/loves lost or gained. Maybe we'd be better off, maybe worse off...obviously we'll never really know. I like to think I have a 'what happened is in the past, leave it there' mentality. Some friends may think otherwise. Things still manage to slip through the cracks of an otherwise solid exterior. And it's not just that one major relationship or that one major mistake - more often than not, what gets to me more are the things that sparked and showed promise but for whatever reason were never fully realized. I read this passage in a book once, which now always comes to mind whenever I play the 'what if' game because it helps me understand (yet again) that what is to be will be: "For, though he did not know it [...] luck was with him that morning. The thinnest covering of luck was on him like fresh dew. While he slipped in and out of consciousness, the position of the planets, the music of the spheres, the flap of a tiger moth's diaphonous wings in Central Africa, and a whole bunch of other stuff that Makes Shit Happen had decided it was second-chance time for Archie. Somewhere, somehow, by somebody, it had been decided that he would live."

But despite my best efforts at forward motion and understanding that things happen for a reason, recently I've found myself backtracking. Sucked into the sheer momentum of certain moments, places, and faces of days gone by. It can be enough to make me burn with the same frustration/anger/resentment/love/regret in the pit of my stomach. Part of it is probably my personality - I don't let go of things or people easily and anything I attach to dies hard in the end. I don't really believe in short-term or temporary anything, friendships or relationships. Those that I love or loved basically sign on for the long haul - I will probably continue to love him or her, even if that person has been out of the picture for months or years (which might be the reason why it's so hard for me to look back and why I try not to do it very often). Most likely I'm not unique in this sense, but it definitely makes for a bit of sadness from time to time mixed with nostalgia and strangely enough, happiness. Happy that it happened even if its over and been beaten to a pulp, or just slowly faded and disappeared altogether. I think the most important thing to keep in mind when I'm in my reminiscing mood is that people are in or out of my life for a reason. Maybe its like Erin said: it's better to keep some people in memories instead of the present, where its safe to love them for who they were and what they meant to you at the time.