Good afternoon my dear grateful-this-year-is-finally-coming-to-an-end-because-I-need-a-holiday-now readers!!
Just a few moments ago, I had the opportunity to connect with a very old and dear friend of mine from college. The conversation has left me deeply emotional, and I know no better way to express gratitude and nostalgia than to write about it. So here goes nothing.
You know, life is just this series of obstacles, struggles, boundaries, limits, and failure with a glimmer of success and hope every now and then. The success is only significant enough to ensure that you continue on this arduous lifelong journey of ‘issues’.
Amidst all the sourness, if you are lucky, really lucky, you come across a few people who are just that right amount of balanced sweetness. I’ve been blessed to call a few of these people my friends. I don’t speak to a lot of them anymore, because, you know, life. But they take up so much large, silent room in my heart and my memories, and I keep them silent because with them, I have also known terrible loss.
Loss of love,
Loss of friendship,
Loss of trust,
Loss of faith.
Just one conversation has left me in tears, because I’m so scared to look back into that life. Not because it was miserable, but because it was so. Frikking. Perfect. It was easy, to buy food from Dining Points and do laundry with Convenience Points. It was easy to bunk classes and sleep till noon and wake up only for lunch. It was blissful to have no agenda for the day except to chill with the most wonderful friends.
I’m scared because I don’t even have remnants of that life anymore.
Don’t get me wrong- I love where I’m at and who I’ve become. I’ve worked SO hard to get here, and I’m proud of myself. I’m so grateful I have two loving families, and the best husband in the entire world.
But I was a different person then. And sometimes, I miss her… I really do. Pictures and memories from those times creep up so unannounced- sometimes while watching TV, sometimes midway through a random conversation- I find myself almost paralyzed with the vividness of those images. And I silently mourn that loss. Quietly. Secretly. Maturely. And then, I pick up the pieces and move on. And I continue to do this until I can no longer remember.
I recently wrote a post, Of All Things Left Behind, https://stardustandsunlight.com/2017/12/01/of-all-things-left-behind/ and this is probably just an extension of that post.
The last few years have asked me to leave so much behind, and even though I have gained so much in return, it’s asking me to compare oranges with apples. You know what I mean? How can I balance or compare two different lives?
Before I reconsider posting these fragments of my musings, I just want to urge all of you to pick up the phone, call up the people you love but haven’t spoken to in weeks, months and years for reasons only known to you. Call them, and revisit that old life. Call them, and pick up the remnants of those friendships.
Once again, thank you for being such faithful readers. I’m grateful to all of you.
Keep reading, keep liking, keep commenting and keep sharing!
Lots of love,
P.
Stardust & Sunlight 