Memories

    So, for context, I have a large Spotify playlist. It's more than 500 songs, and they range from classical to electro-swing to Epic Rap Battles of History to stuff I used to listen to when I first got introduced to the internet. It truly is a wide variation of things that I just get to enjoy during my down time or especially while I'm at work. 

    Lately, Maroon 5's "Memories" has been popping up a lot during my work time. In the past, I wouldn't really think twice about a song like this, but now that I'm dealing with a lot of my emotions and past, this song has been getting to me. Mostly on the front of the versus. If you have never heard this song before, I would highly recommend a listen. 

    As I said, this song is getting to me. It talks mostly about how memories bring back other memories, especially of a particular person. For my personal experience, it brings back two people I've mentioned, and one that I've kind of kept off my blog. Those three would be Arthur, Micah, and someone I will call by an old character name: Hani. Before I ramble more, I will say that a lot of my January has been soaked in thoughts of having a husband and maybe children lately. It culminated in an incident on New Year's Eve that I'm still processing. But these three are sticking out in my head too much, so I would like to take this little post in the catalog of posts to speak semi-directly to them. Between the emotions and the lack of sleep going into today, it is hanging on me like a weight. And maybe, if I finally write out some notes, I can get this weight off of me for a while. 

If you are a newer acquaintance that just came into this little piece of the world, I'm sorry I am laying this all out in a blog post. I don't regularly share this kind of emotional thing, and I wouldn't blame you if you decided to distance yourself from me in the future. I would be equally as understanding if you didn't just distance yourself and decided instead to send some good vibes or prayers toward me. I am really at a lost for what I can do to heal myself right now. The only thing I know to do when I'm feeling like this is to write. So maybe this is the start of a healing process that is long overdue. 

    If you would like to stop here, thank you for reading. I hope you have a wonderful day and rest of your week! 

~~~

    Independent Arthur,

    Oh, how many times our mutual connection (Sirlari being her character name) and her sweet significant other have heard me ramble about you. In what I can only perceive as a mid-life revelation, you left Colorado and headed elsewhere with the hopes of restoring some sort of stability in your life. And I don't blame you. You left when the world was swamped in Covid madness and just general chaos. I had a feeling you were also dealing with your own internal turmoil, given all of the calls and texts we used to send. 

    I hope you are doing alright. I miss you terribly, and I wish I could be comfortable enough to put your number back in my phone and ask how you are doing. But I feel that would be something more harmful than helpful at this point. You have a life you have made now, in a place where you always wanted to go when you weren't teaching in Colorado or dealing with stuff in your family life. I get it. I truly do. I hope that my lack of communication is giving you the space to be who you want to be without a leech like me latching onto you. That's how I feel, at least. You and the next person I will address probably see me as a leech on your time and energy, so I'm trying my best to detach and let go. 

~~~

    Dearest Wild Micah,

    Before Arthur, there was you. I have mentioned on this blog before that I met you in high school. If I'm honest, the rush of emotions I felt around you made me confused and just generally perplexed about what was going on for me. And I honestly thought I had pushed those aside until recently. I have seen you a handful of times since then when your band has played at some local venues, and I have been reminded that those emotions haven't gone away. And they should have. I don't know if you ever really noticed them unless you read the note I gave you last summer. I tried to phrase it in a way that would gently bring things up while avoiding an all-out rejection. But from our interactions at the last show you had, I have a feeling that the rejection is real. And I get it. 

    I hope you are well. I decided I am going to stay out of your sphere of music until around summertime when I hope to join a local symphonic band with a renewed interest in my musical talent again. Thank you for helping to re-ignite my spark for musical instruments and wanting to actually be part of a band again. Sure, choir is one thing, but being in a band is something else that I didn't realize I missed until I was at the Christmas concert in December. I hope by then I can be a bit more detached and healed from my whirlwind of odd emotions so we can perform together. That would be amazing. Then again, I hope to have a better trombone by then too, but we'll see. Like Arthur, I feel like I have been a leech on your time and energy, so I will try to avoid interacting for a while. 

~~~

    Chaotically Comedic Hani, 

    You were my last victim in this strange romantic path I've been on. And for that, I am sorry. I know, I say that a lot. But I don't think I can quite express how much I wish I could remove any of the pain and suffering I caused you. Sure, you probably don't remember a lot of it by now. Our connection ended two years ago, just as I was in the throws of coping with my father dying and dealing with what I felt were negative patterns I saw in both you and him. Looking back now, you were/are right; we could have worked it out. We could have held on and just worked through this together. But in my haste and irrational logic, I decided you and I would be better off separate. While I don't regret my choice (because you truly taught me not to regret things), I do find myself talking to our mutual gaming friends about how I hurt you, and how I feel like I fucked up. Again, I'm truly sorry. 

    I hope you and your family are doing better. I hope that life is just better for you. As much as you seemed content in the life you had, I sensed there was more for you out there. I don't know if you ever felt it. But I hope that you have found a life you are happy with. And I truly hope you have found a sense of love either from people in your family, people in the gaming community we met in, or some other source that I can't think of as I'm writing this. Because you deserve it. The others do, but you the most. I truly feel like you got the worst of me during the time we were together. But I don't know. Time will tell on that.

~~~

    If you made it past this point, I would like to personally apologize to you, darlin' reader. 

    I normally keep this kind of personal rambling off my blog. Sure, there are bits of my life. But I try to keep emotionally-charged posts off my blog. Why? Because I'm scared of what could happen afterward. I'm scared of the feedback. I'm scared of what that change in people's perspective of me. It is part of an old childhood wound I'm working to heal by writing more of this stuff out, or just talking to myself when I have alone time.

    Things are rough for me. I am at a point of my life where I feel so detached from people that I'm worried I don't have many people to connect to anymore. I really want to connect again with people now, but a big part of me worries that I have burned too many bridges and just lost pieces of myself in the process. But in this process, I have gained something I never thought I would have: a sense of peace in who I am as a person. I don't feel as insecure as I used to about what kind of person I am and what kind of things make me happy. I don't feel like I need to be a doormat or a people pleaser anymore. I don't feel like I need to live up to someone else's expectations anymore. Now I face this new situation and all of the repressed emotions I have had for the last 30 years of my life about all of this. 

    But I am done for now. I feel drained between this and the lack of sleep, so I'm going to post this, my photo for the week on Instagram, and then do my little advertisements for this post in the spots of the Internet I do.

Much Love and Strength,

Animus