The Future

The future. I've never been scared about the future. I've never looked ahead like I do now. People may say the future is full of potential, full of opportunity. But sometimes that all depends on your point of view or at least your frame of mind. I may have worried about the future. Would I pass my A-levels? Would I pass university? Would I find a job? Would I find someone to love? Would my dream of a world-trip come true? But there's more than one way to think about it.
We speed along on the highway of life with no U-turn allowed. When I was young it felt as if all the world was still ahead of me. The scenery that went by did so at a steady trot with enough time to take it in and enjoy the view. Problem of course is that when you have the time you never appreciate that you have it. Then as I finished school the pace picked up. College and university were finished so quickly. Before I knew it my new girlfriend had become my ex-girlfriend. And now it feels as if I had even changed into the fast lane. I do not mean this in the musician's sense of the word as "living an eventful life" (though I do try to fill my days). It's more like everything seems to be happening so fast. Three months pass in what seems like days. A year that I just started is already over and I feel like I just finished thinking about my New Year resolutions. The only things that remain are memories that slowly begin to fade. It's as if you were driving fast through a beautiful landscape at night. Things show up in your headlights, you start anticipating them, then they whir past your window and you have hardly enough time to inspect them more closely. When you look at them in the rear view mirror in the red rear lights they already seem all different and changed until they slowly fade back to black. We are merely left with the certain feeling of: "that place was nice, would have been great if I could have stayed there." Will be becomes now. Is becomes was. And was will never be again.
I guess it's normal to feel nostalgic and a bit melancholic when returning to one's childhood home. I sometimes feel the strong urge to live in that house again, in my old room. To have nothing but my homework to do in the afternoon and lots of time to watch the seasons change and go outside to meet friends and play. I am sometimes almost flooded with memories of the Christmases I spent there, of how I used to watch TV for afternoons on end, gaze at the stars at night. They are memories of what the field where the office building is now used to look like, of the games I played with friends. I can still see it clearly in front of my mind's eye. I see it when I look out of the window of my old room or when I stand in our little garden. And I see how at the centre of it all was this very house and the people in it.
But now there is another, a new feeling, too. Suddenly I have this illogical fear of the future. Because it means loss. Eventually I will loose my grandparents and then my parents. Then I will have no more place to go back to. My home, my childhood and the people that tie me to it will be a thing of the past, for good. I realise that in the past I could never imagine a time when they would not be there. It just seemed unrealistic, surrealistic. Looking at them I see how fragile this future has become. It's coming home to me that I will sooner rather than later have to bid them the last farewells. And then my life will never be the same again. I have been lucky in that I have not yet had to deal with the death of a close relative but that also makes me unlucky because I will not be prepared. No matter how much I think about it now, how much I worry or may be afraid, I will not be prepared. I begin wondering how much time there is left. I am caught between wishing for my freedom and feeling the attachment to them. I pray to God - not that this cup may pass me by (because I know it cannot) - but to give it more time.
I sometimes envy other young people for not feeling this so strongly or for not worrying. I still have dreams of going away again, maybe one day not to come back home. But at the same time I know I will regret it dearly if I do not spend at least some of the time I have with them now. I also realise that maybe it is now time to say that even though we have had our clashes and quarrels I do appreciate them because God knows there are enough people out there who did not take the opportunity and regretted it bitterly. Then I hope there will at least not be any tears of regret when the time comes and is does become was.

The Greatest Thing ...

I've watched that film again ... after a very long time. The medium has changed. So has the place. I thought I could watch it now like I do any other film in my collection. But some things time does not change.
As the familiar sights and sounds flood over me so do the memories. It was the first movie we watched together. She had to work hard to persuade me to watch it with her but I ended up loving it as much as she did. We absorbed it and it became us in a certain way. It may seem naive or silly now but we found a deeper, personal meaning in the story and the characters and the songs. We would later quote from it and see ourselves as similarly fated star-crossed lovers.
But most of all it became our first tangible shared experience. Sitting in the dark cinema with her she had to keep telling me to focus on the film. I was too overwhelmed by her presence next to me. I remember it now as clearly as if it had been last week.

And you can tell everybody this is your song.
It may be quite simple but now that it's done
I hope you don't mind, I hope you don't mind,
that I put down in words how wonderful life is now you're in the world.

Hearing these words now I remember how it as a time when love was something mad, wild and dreamy like a force of nature. I remember listening to the song and for the first time I understood what the character was singing about. I was delirious.
And even though a lot of things have changed since then - feelings and people - I still recall those moments and the feelings then. The film has become my memory aid. By watching it I can relive those days a bit. And though I am happy now I do feel a sting that all that is past now and will not come back. I want to be back there in that dark cinema and dream again. I cannot feel anymore like I did then. It's never quite the same again. The first time is and will always be special. Maybe it's a blessing for her that she has forgotten. Maybe I should too. But there will probably always be this pang of regret now that I didn't make it last forever the way I had meant to when we were sitting in that dark cinema together and listened to those magical words:

The greatest thing you'll ever learn
is just to love and be loved in return.