preserve your memories....

...they're all that's left you.

"old friends"

I have been having absolutely hideous attacks of severe melancholia lately. I suppose it's all to be expected for my life stage and such, but that doesn't make it easier to take. I blame Facebook. ;-)

Seriously, reconnecting with folks who, for the most part, I've not seen since high school in 1980-something has been wonderful, but saddish. Nobody gets out of life unscathed, of course, but I do wish it were possible to get through it without getting overly battered, bruised and otherwise wounded.

I started thinking last night about all the "me's" that have been "me" in my lifetime. I can sort of vaguely recall being a bouncy, fearless little kid. Then I hit 12-13 and it all went to hell.

So here's what I've come up with, more or less in order:

-- happy me
-- brutal teenage depression/angst me
-- wild child me ('swhat happens when a repressed Catholic girl raised on guilt gets away from home for the first time ;-)
-- Lost-and-drifting me
-- Motivated to finally finish school and get a job doing what I'd always wanted me
-- Academic achiever me (bolstered by the ed psych who finally believed me and apologized for all the other educators who hadn't from ages 5-31)
-- Starting off 10 years behind but at least I have a decent job finally me (aka professional me)
-- Onward and upward me (with interruptions for serious illness, both physical and emotional)
-- Older, wiser, sadder me having to figure out all over again what's next and what matters

What dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil....?

For the record, here's the lyrics to the song:

Old friends
Old friends
Sat on their park bench
Like bookends
A newspaper blown through the grass
Falls on the round toes
Of the high shoes
Of the old friends

Old friends
Winter companions
The old men
Lost in their overcoats
Waiting for the sun
The sounds of the city
Sifting through trees
Settles like dust
On the shoulders
Of the old friends

Can you imagine us years from today
Sharing a park bench quietly?
How terribly strange to be seventy

Old friends
Memory brushes the same years
Silently sharing the same fear...

Time it was, and what a time it was, it was
A time of innocence, a time of confidences
Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph
Preserve your memories; they're all that's left you