Lost in a Sea of Memories
A couple of days ago my present took me back to the past and I've been swirling around in a memory fog. Can you believe it's been twenty-four years? TWENTY-FOUR YEARS!! First at DearDiary, and then, here. What I wrote, what I felt, what happened, it's still here. I can't believe it's still here!?!
Memories of conversations, people, places, decisions, moments. Places where I went left instead of right. Places where I had to "say yes" instead of "no". Images keep flashing like an instagram movie in my head of people who influenced me in subtle, profound and provocative ways - many of which now only exist in my life as a stamped passport of moments I will never forget.
A couple of days ago, I was overwhelmed. Life, my friends is not always pretty or easy. To be fair, I'm a pretty strong person and I can take a lot. Sometimes though I just need to unpack everything I carry and sit with it a while until I'm ready to buckle everything back up and go on my merry way. This last time, when I had my latest 'unbuckling', I started thinking about Dad. He's been gone now for almost 20 years. Hard to believe when it just seems like yesterday.
When Dad passed away, I had such a hard time. Everything has to go on. Plans needed to be made. Spirits need to be lifted and Mom needed someone to help carry the load for a while. I was strong for my family. Strong and (at that time) single, trying to continue on with life as if nothing had happened. But as anyone who has ever lost someone important can tell you, the cracks appear and no matter how much you try to run away from what you feel, eventually everything needs to come down so it can be rebuilt into a new form. Stronger. More resilient. The Japanese have an art form called kintsukuroi.' Broken pottery is rebuilt with the cracks filled with a combo of laquer and gold, silver or platinum. What makes the pieces so beautiful isn't how the pottery is made, it's where it's been cracked.
Anyways, I reached out to both MsT and Timuri a couple of days ago. Timuri to thank him for being there after Dad died and MsT to help me find the space to breathe again. I must have sounded like I was in a bad space, since I got a text message and a phone call this morning telling me she was going to be here in 5 minutes not to go anywhere. I had just read the message and the phone rang. She was here. She drove over an hour and a half to spend some time with me. She shows up and I'm in my 4-day unwashed hair (don't judge) with a house that has seen cleaner days. It was unexpected, unannounced and unbelievably wonderful to have a chance to speak not over text, or an email, or a brief video chat as we're running from one place to another. But to really connect.
We went outside and sat under the umbrella and got caught up the way only close friends can. You know those great friendships where even if it's been forever, once you're together it feels like you just saw them yesterday? The hugs may be a bit longer, but the sparkle of friendship just shines. We got to talking about everything and nothing. She and I are complete opposites. I'm conservative, she's liberal. She's serious vegan, I'm serious carnivore. She's Pagan, I'm Catholic - you get the drift. Opposites. But somehow all those opposites don't matter. She's good people and throughout the years, she's had my back and I'd like to think I've had hers as well.
When I brought up I'd been texting with Timuri, we decided to try and connect with him on a video. I thought my face was going to split into two I was smiling so much. I can't even remember when we were all in the same room together. It might have been 15 years or more. For a moment I think we were all stunned, then we just went on talking and getting caught up until he had to go. Shortly after I had to go to Mom's for lunch so MsT and I parted ways as well. I can't tell you what was talked about under the umbrella, but we laughed so hard at some joined memories and funny misunderstandings and shared more of what's going on in our lives. I don't think I realized how much I missed being able to just look into her eyes and talk like we used to. Technology is great, but it can never replace that physical connection.
Since Friday, I've been going in and out of memories laughing about so many situations I put myself in. I was able to go back through the journals to when it all started. I've been reading about how I formed these friendships, how my stalker became my guide and how a gal at a wedding became one of my best friends. I allowed myself to explore what I wanted out of life. I fearlessly asked questions and sought out the answers, even when I didn't know how the answers would effect me. I 'said Yes' to so many things that filled me with fear. I wasn't fearless, because I felt fear at all these new experiences, but I let duende possess me and reveled in the music it revealed.
There was a time before I was a Mom, a wife, a homemaker, the Cupcake Queen of the PTA Bake Sale, and church singer when my life was all about feeling. The very core of my being lived in a place of heady passion. The passing years have filled these places with jobs, a mortgage, an amazing husband, a fantastic kid, an aging parent, and all the realities of life until passion exists as a quiet whisper in my life, hiding out in the corners coming out every so often to remind me it's still there, waiting there to be released. Today the memories reminded me of when the passion was a roar - when my days and nights were overwhelmed with the sheer power of who and what I am.
Maybe it's time to discover that passion again. Not in the same way as before because, I'm a very happily married woman who is NOT looking to implode her life. Even if I wanted to, those experiences could never be re-captured. Maybe it's time to go on a new discovery and find out whatever it is I need to re-ignite my life and make it everything it can be.
The first time my life was mapped out at 6am on the back of a napkin and a borrowed pen in a diner in Oregon. The next time my guide appeared and he helped conduct me through a symphony of experiences. This time - I don't know what it will be or how it will look, but I do know it's time fill my life with passion again.
How I'm going to get there? I guess that's what I need to figure out again.