Month: July 2019

Some say the past should be left in the past, but I have found a lot of strength in reflecting on my past.  Over the past few weeks, I have been trying to spend some time in meditation.  With my eyes closed and my mantra silently repeating over and over again in my mind, I tend to drift back.  And I realize that it is because I am telling myself “I am capable” that I drift back to see all that I have overcome.  I see faces and hear voices that sometimes bring me to tears.   Today, like so many days, I remembered Mic.  I find it difficult to write about Mic because I am afraid someone will read this and think I am crazy. But since I write for myself (and might be a little crazy), here goes.

I smile as I remember walking past you for the first time, seeing that big cheesy smile, and feeling that I had known you all my life.  I had never felt anything like it before, nor have I since.  We were meant to meet.  We were meant to fall in love.  And we were meant to drift apart.  It is hard to say that, but it is true.  You will always be the one who got away.  You will always be the one I let get away.  We were young and everything was exciting.  I was immature and trying to be more adult than I ever will be.  You were my ideal soulmate.  I think I may have loved you more…I know I needed you more…

You showed me what I was capable of feeling.  You showed me how love could be fun and spontaneous and impossible to maintain without effort on both sides.  When I was down on myself, you were the one who would bring me back to reality.  You made me feel that I could do whatever I put my mind to doing.  You took a broken child…and gave a young woman the strength to walk away.  That is what happened.  I was so stubborn and so sure that there were aspects of life that I needed to conquer that I walked away from the opportunity of a life together and eventually ended up living a life alone.

But I can’t regret it.  I will never regret loving you or of taking the chance of being vulnerable with you.  I will never regret the years spent talking across miles or sending the most bizarre care packages back and forth.  I will never forget our love of music, of poetry, of each other.  And your words will stay with me always—telling me that I can do this…whatever this happens to be at the moment.  I wish we could have seen each other again or spoken to each other again.  I wish I could have told you how important you are to me.  I will never have that chance, and for that I will grieve forever.  The world is not a better place without you in it, but my heart will hold you always; and I am most certainly a better person because I loved you.

It is okay to have a past.  It is okay because I also have a future.  Drifting back in time, I started remembering first loves–first loves of varying degrees.  Sigh.

I had the awkward vision of The One. The One I chased and finally caught or got caught up in. That night…I saw him just as I did more than 30 years ago.  Snapshots in my mind. The jaw line. The skin…slightly freckled. And then the overwhelming awkwardness.  A teenager sitting on our couch, half-undressed. I saw the curly mop of hair nearly covering his eyes. I saw the tighty whitey underwear and suddenly I was nearly knocked out of the memory by embarrassment and shame…shame of my youth and uncertainty.  And then I stopped myself.  No!  It is okay!  It is okay to have this memory and to have felt those feelings. And it is okay and a blessing that my mind took in so many details that more than three decades later I can close my eyes and see–almost feel–the presence of someone now so long gone.

I am no longer a teenager–far from it.  And I didn’t make the best choices, but they were my choices.  It is okay that I allowed myself to feel what I did both then and now.

I was capable of knowing first love…many different types of first loves. This memory.  This was tumultuous, difficult…somewhat destructive first love.  And I am glad I experienced it.  This memory.  That night.  The years that followed.  I’m glad I experienced it all.  Acknowledging now how I was responsible for much of the struggle and heartache that followed allows me to take accountability and grow in my personal journey.  I am capable. I am capable of making mistakes.  I’m sorry, Albert (not his real name but an inside joke).  I’m sorry that I helped create the monster that you became and the one that eventually overcame you.

I remember sitting in the back of a pickup, noticing the icy blue look of your eyes.  I remember telling you I wanted to know what was behind them.  I thought I was going to “fix” you.  You were a sad, lonely, abandoned, hurt little boy trapped inside an angry teenager.  I was a fool.  In this life, we don’t “fix” people.  We simply need to love them.