I’ve never been a particularly sentimental person. I have a few mementos from my youth and my college experience, but not many. I’ve been more of an “in the moment” or “thinking about the future” type person. But these days, I’m having to get to know another part of myself that I didn’t really spend much time with before – the me who can spend an entire afternoon lost in memories, the me who can hear one phrase and be transported back to another place and time.
I’ve found sometimes I have to call myself back, back to the present, when my heart and my mind would so much prefer to be in the past – when life was good, easier, simpler. It’s not hard to get lost in the memories now that I have people I love so much and who were a part of my daily life, who are no longer here to share my love with.
Sometimes I’ve gone somewhere full of good memories: our courtship, buying our house, our wedding, Ember the kitten joining our family, time we spent with friends & family, ultrasounds where we got to see George moving around inside of me, discovering new games… Other times I end up somewhere with harder memories – Sara’s anxiety, learning Sara had cancer, George’s death, the night we had to call the ambulance and Sara was hospitalized for what became the last time….
I treasure all of these destinations, whether they were full or joy or full of pain (and few that were full of both), because they were our life together. Love was the foundation of it all.
Tonight I’m sitting at the dining room table, drinking a glass of wine – the glass was Sara’s, from before we met. I remember helping her pack up her apartment when we moved in together. Our table was the first furniture purchase together for our house – we both immediately agreed it was the one. I see the books on the bookshelf – a mix of hers, mine, and ours. Some duplicates that we both had. A rainbow flag hanging in the front window was on Sara’s desk when she died – I don’t know when or from where she got it, but I decided a few months ago that it deserved to be displayed.
It’s impossible for me to live in this home, with our things, without occasionally (or perhaps frequently) getting sucked into the memories that are attached. What I have to figure out is how to call myself back gently, with love – I can sit in those memories, but I can’t stay there forever. I have to come back. There are reasons for me to be here in the present – friends, family, our dogs and cat – even myself. But sometimes it’s just… hard. Occasionally on a day where I have no other obligations, I just curl up in bed and get lost – travel back in time and let my heart wander.