Some Would Say I Should Let It All Go. Let Go Of The Love. Forget The Memories. Im Only Hurting Myself

Some would say I should let it all go.  Let go of the love.  Forget the memories.  I’m only hurting myself by hanging on.

Then I realize, it is never wrong to love someone, even if they do not return it.

2024/02/23

Remembering

You gave me the photo albums,

Wanting to erase your memories.

Sometimes, I wish I could too.

But then I think,

It is better to remember love,

Than to forget.

2024/02/23

I Wonder

(2024/02/14)

We did not fight or argue,

Though we drifted apart.

It has been years,

And on this Valentine’s Day,

And every day,

I wonder why.

Unforeseen

The greatest hurt…

That I am no longer allowed to tell you, I love you.

2024/02/27

It Happened Again

Originally Written and Posted June 28, 2012, edited in 2024

It happened again.

Time heals all wounds, they say . . .

I have grown more comfortable in my own skin then I have felt for a very long time.  With comfort comes a certain beige banality. Hermitage has a homogeneity.  I would not say that it lacks stimulation, but the emotions are soft.  The highs aren’t so high, the lows not so low, and there are very few turns in the road.  It isn’t bad really.  It is serviceable, comfortable, and safe.  I rather like it that way, but it does come at a cost.  Yin and Yang eternally strapped to the seesaw.

It happened again.  Like most nights, when I laid down last night, I sent out my thoughts.  There is no god, but there is an energy and I send my thoughts out into it.  I wish Alex well, and Dad, and Kim.  I think of Mom.  And I think of Elizabeth.  I hope that she is well and all right, and happy. Like most nights, my mind worked, drifting from thought to thought, examining an issue here, and reflecting on a resolution there.  And then the blackness absorbed me.

Being a night-owl hops your life around the clock.  During the mid-morning hours, when most are starting to feel the weight of the day, I usually still lie prone.  Often this is when the dreams are deepest. This morning was no exception.  It started simply.  I was unpacking something, a tiny trinket – a small teapot and high-heeled shoe on a miniature platform, all porcelain and white and pure, and all no bigger than two thumbs.  It made me think.  “Had I missed something?”

I rushed into the middle room of my hermit’s hole, where I opened a file cabinet drawer.  I found an old yearbook, with signatures and pictures.  It was hers.  “Oh my, I will have to get this back to her.” Then a pair of fur edged gloves, and several floppy, fabric, flowered purses.  And then books – books upon books upon books, filling the drawer as if it were a gateway to a larger dimension.  “Oh my.”  I clutched a colorful clutch and held it to my cheek, and began to weep.  “I’m sorry.  I am so very sorry.”

Suddenly I woke with the sorrow heavy, the concern real. Were there really things I had accidentally spirited away?  No.  Then I remembered.  I know every nick and knack in my recluse’s realm; there are no beautiful bags or boxes of books that should not be here. It was a dream, full of deep emotions not felt during the steady pace of my waking life.

They say time heals all wounds.  But these are not wounds, and I will keep them safe.

Memory Loss On Memory Lane

(2024/02/17)

When a relationship is broken, one of the many things we lose is mutual recall.

We all get nostalgic feelings from specific things, perhaps a place, a scent, or a song.  For many of us in my generation, TV theme songs can be a real kick down sentimental memory lane.

Lately, part of my late night routine involves the TV being turned on to Catchy TV, and the show “Newhart” – not the “The Bob Newhart Show”, where Bob Newhart plays a psychiatrist, but “Newhart”, where he plays the owner of a little inn, in Vermont.  For me, there is something very emotional about the theme.

The emotion connects directly with my ex, Elizabeth.  But here is the catch; “Newhart” ran from 1982 to 1990.  I did not meet Elizabeth until 1990.  As such, the bulk of the show ran during a previous – and most unsettling – marriage.  The nostalgic tug of the theme does not bring up any of the negative emotions or associations with the first marriage.  The feelings the theme brings up are tied to Elizabeth.

Elizabeth and I were big fans of “Twin Peaks” when we first met.  I have a very strong emotional response to that theme song.  “Twin Peaks” premiered in 1990.  My memory of it and Elizabeth is crystal clear.  But my memory of Elizabeth and “Newhart” is non-existent.  I have only the emotional tug of the theme to give me a clue.  And when I look at the dates “Newhart” aired, she and I could have only watched the last season together, or perhaps reruns.  That said, I do have a vague recollection of us discussing the college drinking game, “Hello Bob”, where everyone is required to take a drink whenever someone says “Hello, Bob” during “The Bob Newhart Show”.  Likewise, there is a nebulous memory of discussing the fun characters Larry, Darryl and Darryl from “Newhart”, but these memories are so foggy, I could have had those debates with anyone.

Oh, how I wish we could have remained a friendship connection, to email each other or to be able to have a dinner every now and then.  I do send her a happy birthday email every year, and I give her a Christmas gift every year – secretly place by her door around midnight on each Christmas Eve, with the card signed, “ . . .  Santa”.  The three dots represent, “I Love You”.  She knows who “Santa” is, but she does not know what the dots mean.  Fourteen years now, Santa has left his gifts.  Fourteen years, and she has sent me a small gift of her own, sent via my daughter.

In 2023, for the first time in those fourteen years, I did get to see her and talk for a bit.  Her cheer and bubble was as effervescent as ever.  She looked happy, and healthy, and honestly, beautiful.  She had moved into a new house, and had an old family clock from my Dad that she no longer had a place for, and she wanted to return it to me.  I crumbled in the meeting.  I was not emotionally strong enough, but all this is a bit of a digression.

Would that I could ask her, “Did we watch ‘Newhart’ often?”  As a couple, you have more RAM and even more ROM – your hardwired memory is larger, and your randomly accessed recall is greater. When a relationship is broken, we lose so many things.  At times, like my first marriage, the breakup was the beginning of a new life.  I was reborn.  The breakup with Elizabeth has left me feeling old, feeble, and forgetful.