On wanting a time machine…

On wanting a time machine…

by cindereulla ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

 

There are so many people you encounter in life. Good people. Wise people. Funny people. Morose people. People who are amazing compilations of so many things. Sometimes they are contradictory. Sometimes they are vapid shells of a person that exist solely for immediate comforts. I think some of the most fascinating people are the ones that say they live life with no regrets. Now, I believe that, as humans we have the ability to look back on a regrettable moment and see the merit in it. I believe we can rationalize just about anything. However, it is also my belief that if you really look at a person when they say they have no regrets, if you really look closely, you will see something else.  Their eyes will betray them. It’s just for a fraction of a second. It flashes in the corner of their eyes. Look closely. You’ll see it. The last dying breath of a wish. It passes oh so quickly. Gone before the person even has the chance to process it’s true meaning. They have already begun summon up the endless list of reasons why something was acceptable, or meaningful, or helpful.  Or, and this is my very favorite, defining. We love to call difficult, regrettable moments defining. It means it all happened for a reason. It means there was purpose. This is a survival technique. I realize this. It’s part of how we carry on.

But, suppose for one second that we allowed that spark of a wish to take life. What would happen? We’ve spun a whole genre of entertainment around it. Back to the Future, Peggy Sue got Married, Doctor Who. It is nothing more than a safe way to ask ourselves that very question. Suppose, we could go back and change it all. What are the ramifications of it? Every story has reasons why we can’t. Rifts in the space/ time continuum, changes in existence, set points in time. All answers to the heartbreaking desire to not live with regret. We know it is impossible.

I know, without a doubt in my mind that given the opportunity, I would jump on the chance to go back. I wouldn’t even give it a second thought. December 15, 2000. That is the moment I would go back to. So many things I would do differently. So many things I would relive and savor every last second, because this time around I would really know it was the last. I would enjoy the feel of pulling on a pair of size zero jeans with no difficulty. I would go to my great-grandparent’s house and be woken up far too early by the smell of bacon frying. I would listen to every single word she had to say as we sat on that wooden porch swing as we looked through the rain at the apple orchard. I would ask her the things that mattered, like how do you know when someone really loves you. I wouldn’t count the hours until I could get back home to my boyfriend. I would tell her I love her.  I would talk to my mother and relish in the sound of her voice being strong and assertive. I would take one last walk through my old band room and gym. I would go to one last Friday Night Lights. I would have adventures by myself. I would hold out for someone who adored me. I would say proper goodbyes to people I never got the chance to because I thought there was a tomorrow.

I don’t believe that anyone really lives life without regret. I think that would imply that they never fully felt the pain of a specific moment to begin with. It would imply that they are not human. I can’t truly speak for anyone else. I know this. I guess the truth is that I don’t want  to believe it. I think regret keeps us trying. I think it makes us want to change the future, because in the end we know we can’t change the past. As much as we long to, we can’t. But we can change the future, and isn’t that amazing?

 

On being ambushed by grief… an open letter to someone I loved…

On being ambushed by grief… an open letter to someone I loved…

by cindereulla ♥ 2 Comments

I was completely unprepared for how very hard it hit me. I was minding my own business. Living. That’s what I’m supposed to do. That’s what I’m best at. Doing what I’m supposed to do. I sat on my bed and held your shirt. The blue and white plaid Daniel Cremieux one that you were so fond of. You would wear it untucked with the sleeves folded up. You would saunter casually with your hands in your pockets. So confident. I held it in my hands, inhaling your scent. It still smells like you. Hei by Alfred Sung and Tide. I am overwhelmed by it. I close my eyes and I can see your face, your eyes, your smile. I can feel your cheek on mine. Rough. You laugh and pull me in. My chest constricts. I feel the grief and regret smother me. It ambushes me. Caught me off guard. I was so unprepared.

I know you are on the other side of the world. Its nighttime there.  So very far away. You are not thinking of me, not grieving, not counting the lost days. Or have you found something of mine and been transported to another time? Another place? Somewhere hopeful and bright? Can you feel the sun on our bodies as we lay in the grass, our hands intertwined, my leg draped over yours? Can you see me leaning over you gazing into your perfect brown eyes and can you feel my lips press to yours promising you everything and forever with that kiss? Does it break your heart the way it does mine? Do you mourn the death of the idea of what we were supposed to be? Or, am I just a brief glimpse of scenery, a stopover on the road you’ve travelled?

It seems cruel that simply breathing in the scent trapped in the fibers of your forgotten article of clothing could do this to me still. After all these years. Your memory lives for me in this piece of fabric that once clung to your tall, slender frame. I am rendered helpless, frozen, trapped in the memory.

So, I set it down, stand up and place it on the top shelf of my closet, to be ambushed another day when I’ve forgotten I’ve put it there. I can’t quite bring myself to discard it. That makes is too real. Too final. Having it means you were real and we happened. It means for that for one brief, golden moment we were hopelessly in love and happy and hopeful. Everything changed, but for that glorious moment I was a part of love and it was wonderful.

If I was courageous, if I was brave, I would send this letter. I would tell you that the only reason I left you was I knew that you loved me too much to leave of your own accord. I would tell you that having to break your heart was one of the hardest things I had done at that point in my life. There were so many things you wanted to do, so many adventures you wanted to have, but I couldn’t leave everything and go with you. I knew you would have stayed. You said so through the tears that proved I was ripping your heart to shreds. I would tell you I hated myself in that moment. I would tell you that the idea of you staying just to be with me, and you waking up one day and looking at me with regret was more than I could withstand. I would tell you that I instantly regretted it because I knew what it meant. It meant that someday you would hate me after the hurt wore off.  I would tell you that I loved you too much to keep you like a caged bird. It was the only way I knew you would leave. It was the only way I knew how to make you live the life you dreamed of. I would tell you how sorry I am. I loved you so much. I would tell you that.

If I were courageous I would also tell you how happy I am that you are happy. I would tell you that when I see your posted pictures of you in exotic places, after the heartache wears off, I am happy to see you smiling. I would tell you to have an adventure for me.

But I am not courageous and I will never send this letter. I will never tell you any of this. You will never know how you touched my life and my heart. You will never know there is a girl on the other side of the world who misses you terribly and would love nothing more than to turn the corner at a book shop and see you there with your hands in your pockets and your wild hair hanging in your eyes. To have you turn to me, take a minute for recognition to set in and then smile and hug me. For you to look at me with a smile.

This won’t happen. Maybe someday I will be able to get rid of that stupid button up shirt and not think of what we had or what was yet to be. Maybe someday I will not be ambushed by grief when I see it. Until that day it will stay on that shelf, a souvenir of one of the happiest times in my life. One of the last times I remember being truly happy.