(no subject)
After a year
The nights were so good. Maybe it was because it was my first time; maybe it was the satisfaction of a long wish granted. Memories that used to cut like broken glass now cover like a warm blanket. Things I’d all but forgotten, or chosen not to remember, keep presenting themselves like surprises in an advent calendar. They no longer hurt; they're beautiful. But there’s a solemnity to their beauty, a satisfaction that’s just out of grasp. That I can think on them at all is satisfying, but with what kind of attachment I take to them, I struggle. There is a hope in the midst of the lament, a sense of growth and improvement, but also the icy slivers of regret--regret for what never was, what might have been, what isn’t. The improvement lies in the fact that there is no regret for what actually was.
Until you actually experience the jolting pain that courses through your chest, born of your heart, that follows a realization of something you lost, you cannot understand the human capacity for lamentation. I don’t speak of death in this instance, as death is something altogether different, and requires a different reaction of us. We understand when something or someone dies. When two people have to end their correspondence, for whatever reason, there’s a different sense of loss. Often it’s a mutual decision, fueled from anger or pain or revenge. But sometimes it comes down to making painful decisions now to avoid painful situations later. If you love something, set it free. . .
The reason may never make sense to me, but the acceptance has grown. With the memories now, I can also take with me what I made and used, and recycle the rest like the leftover pieces of cutout paper. I imagine this is a good indicator of life in itself. My fault was in my own idea of failure. Nobody ordered me to get it right all the time, so why did I not justify do-overs? If emotional growth were also measured in inches, I’d be feet taller.
12 November 2010
The nights were so good. Maybe it was because it was my first time; maybe it was the satisfaction of a long wish granted. Memories that used to cut like broken glass now cover like a warm blanket. Things I’d all but forgotten, or chosen not to remember, keep presenting themselves like surprises in an advent calendar. They no longer hurt; they're beautiful. But there’s a solemnity to their beauty, a satisfaction that’s just out of grasp. That I can think on them at all is satisfying, but with what kind of attachment I take to them, I struggle. There is a hope in the midst of the lament, a sense of growth and improvement, but also the icy slivers of regret--regret for what never was, what might have been, what isn’t. The improvement lies in the fact that there is no regret for what actually was.
Until you actually experience the jolting pain that courses through your chest, born of your heart, that follows a realization of something you lost, you cannot understand the human capacity for lamentation. I don’t speak of death in this instance, as death is something altogether different, and requires a different reaction of us. We understand when something or someone dies. When two people have to end their correspondence, for whatever reason, there’s a different sense of loss. Often it’s a mutual decision, fueled from anger or pain or revenge. But sometimes it comes down to making painful decisions now to avoid painful situations later. If you love something, set it free. . .
The reason may never make sense to me, but the acceptance has grown. With the memories now, I can also take with me what I made and used, and recycle the rest like the leftover pieces of cutout paper. I imagine this is a good indicator of life in itself. My fault was in my own idea of failure. Nobody ordered me to get it right all the time, so why did I not justify do-overs? If emotional growth were also measured in inches, I’d be feet taller.
12 November 2010