this is the problem:  i am an inveterate muser, hopelessly mawkish, sappy and sentimental.  a melancholy baby.

give me the right soundtrack and the right kind of afternoon-tinged sunlight, and i find myself tripping down that lane again.  the endless lane of what ifs and what could-have-beens.  the wonderings of who and what i left behind in my headlong, headstrong rush.

i rush ahead, for fear of being left behind.  and so i crash forward full steam, all the while looking back.  i make burn-bridges decisions, and then stand on the other shore, watching the flames and wondering why i’ve cut myself off from the mainland.

does everyone do this?  think about people they used to know and people they used to be, and wonder just why the hell exactly they turned left instead of right?

and maybe everyone does it, but probably few do it with my special talent for wallowing in the heart-filled heartsickness of wishing.  i revel in them, these waves of longing and ambivalence and memory.  i take immense pleasure in the self-centred act of surrendering to the waves.  allowing them to wash over me, drown me with their sweet sorrow.  it’s the beauty of a really poignant song that reminds me of an affair that ended badly, but was oh so fun while it lasted.  it’s the smell of late summer afternoons that brings me back to a place were i was once lonely, but which i filled with wine and poetry and hours of museums.  it’s the flashback to a quiet walk in the fog with a good friend, who i did not then know i would never see again.

see?  told you i was good at it.

i could turn it off, if i wanted to, i suppose.  i sometimes suppose i should – it has the effect of stirring me to disenchantment.  the present can never answer the questions of the past, or fulfill those old desires.

but there is a richness to those moments – holding pleasure and pain in the same instant can be exquisite.  a complexity that brings each feeling to its fullest expression. a pairing of acidity with sun-ripened sweetness.

and so i wallow.  i turn up the music, pour some more red, pore over old words, old photos.  i let my eyes fill up, just because.

because life is beautiful and sad and full of songs and memories that can make you cry.  because i am an inveterate muser, a melancholy baby.

much as i might dwell on what might have  been, i wouldn’t have it any other way.

do you not yearn at all? – the acorn

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Like this post

Unlike