| Subject: Did five years... |
Author:
Joe
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Date Posted: 18:21:47 04/07/11 Thu
Author Host/IP: c-75-64-217-4.hsd1.ms.comcast.net/75.64.217.4
In reply to:
Beth
's message, "Are you out there?" on 09:23:47 05/31/05 Tue
...make a difference?
It seems so long. It is so long. And, yet, the dean comes into my office--we'd been talking about her husband troubles, how she's overbearing and he's shy and their marriage counselor told them to try easing back on both of those habits in favor of the other.
And we talked about my world, my latest in a string of frivilous women that seems to stretch back for nearly ever. And I talked about you--first time, to another person, in... Christ, years.
And the memory of it was warm.
Not just the Us, but even the times when it was us.
I think I still greatly miss you. I wonder, for now, whether you were that great love of my life that all the better class of talented people talk about defining you.
This is, I suppose, a message in a bottle. It has the 100% (or near enough) likelihood of never hitting the beach anywhere--but that's alright. I guess its an introspection piece in a place anyone can get to and nobody will.
Five years...
I went back to school. Not for any reason, except I needed something to do that was familiar.
I met a useless blonde that made me happy for a while. I moved on from that.
I put my life in the trunk of my car and sold cars. Found I was good at that, promoted and got traded to the major leagues on that and ended up dealing with a useless brunette that made me happy for a while. I moved on from that.
I started working in education. It made me feel good. I as noticed and given a tie and an expense account and got paid to fly everywhere and solve problems. I met a useless brunette that made me happy for a while. Moved on from the latter.
There was fun in those times. Friends trying and failing and succeeding. My father moved away. I miss him all the time. David went into the Air Force. I never go to Yazoo.
I've been in Anaheim and Chicago and Cincinnati and Atlanta... and I've racked up frequent miles and loyalty points.
And still, when I think of regrets I have, I think of you.
There were a lot of things I never got to say because I'm proud and I'm self-conscious and between those... well, I'm not the type to call and pester and be pathetic. Bad enough to lose someone's love, worse to lose their respect as well.
But in the years following I often wondered what happened.
I think I know. It took time.
I never appreciate your world as much as I should have. I lived much for me, and not enough for you. I never cheated. Never lied. I never did anything... well, wrong.
But that doesn't mean doing everything right. I was pretentious. I was aloof. And in all that, I was also never around.
And one day, that was too much. And you wanted someone who would be.
A couple of times, and I don't think this odd for the age we live in, I looked at the glimpses of your life and it looks like its been a good one. Some hard things. Very hard. And good things. It looks like a happy life.
I see traces of all of it--except me. I don't think I blame you for being ashamed of me, or exorcising me from your story so completely.
You were, if you can believe it, the person that made me--just by being you--the most happy to be me. And I won't act like there hasn't been joy and love and affection since, but it hasn't been quite the same.
Yours was a flavor I preferred.
It all sounds like flattery--but its not. I don't say what I don't mean. And I'm not, not ever I hope, prone to bother old girlfriends--any.
But you came up in conversation, for the first time in years. And I haven't stopped thinking about it. Not incessantly, but in some difficult things it has calmed me--a crutch maybe.
A very serious part of me is deeply in love with you, I think will always be. I thought that half a decade might make it go away, but its only helped pile more mattresses on the pea. I won't be so dramatic as to say forlorn things like "oh, I shall not ever be over you" because life goes on and has gone on and will go on and it has many flavors all its own.
But I can say that I've stopped wanting that part to die off and go silent. I used to. It made me feel weak and foolish, and I refused to hear it and hated myself--deeply--for it.
Now?
I think I don't mind that its there--it makes no demands on me. It doesn't ask me to do anything or make me do anything. It just sings in the corner of my sad excuse for a heart (maybe that was a bit dramatic, but it feels right)... my clockwork heart. Or what I like to think is one.
It sings. And its a beautiful song.
Its an old song, and hasn't any bearing on what the music is like now--but as it is, its wonderful.
I miss you greatly.
-Bryan
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