reaching out, or not
/I’m hunting an old boyfriend on the internet.
Blame it on the holidays.
In addition to the stress, fear, exhaustion, expectation, excitement, and disappointment -- the holidays also bring a reminder of the people who’ve occupied a big or tiny corner of love tucked in our hearts. We want to reach out, say hello, shoot them a line, make an old-fashioned phone call.
Or stalk them on the internet.
Which is what I’m doing.
In my defense, I’ve hardly done any of this. Hardly scanned around in Facebook or police blotters for people long ago left behind. Always thought I’d somehow see them again but never did. Always considered them in some strange satellite kind of way still in my orbit -- a moon out there to reel in.
Then the years went by. The moon went dark.
Yet each holiday, members of this ghostly, distant, far-flung ancient clan pop into my head. And I want to tell them they’ve popped. Not more than that really, just hello wherever you are. It’s dumb perhaps, a waste of time, even potentially dangerous -- who knows what they’ve become?
I have my eye on one particular guy, I’ll call him Jack. We dated for a long time a long time ago, then he moved across the country. He called at first, then nothing, from either of us. For decades.
Why bother?
Because it’s the holidays. And because there are not so many people, as we look back over our lives, who’ve stayed with us through the years, who’ve embodied one of the thousands of definitions of love.
People have done it to me. Just months ago, I received an e-mail from an old flame -- I’ll call him Barney -- a fearless note. It ended like this: “If my message has intrigued you, after all these years, please let me know.”
I knew him when I was 18 years old. 18!
Still a gutsy guy, too much for my taste. I didn’t respond. He sounded all single and available, which I’m not, and really what was the purpose. I still feel guilty though. Left a little of his love -- some definition of it -- on the table.
In our world, should even this kind of love -- whatever it is -- be squandered?
So, I’m staring at a picture on the internet, doing my own sleuthing. I think I’ve found Jack from my twenties, but I’m not sure. He’s put on weight -- the surest way to change your look. And he’s gotten so much older. Just like me.
Is it him?
I pull out pictures from a torn album. Look how cute he was, I say to my poor husband, Ray, who I’m dragging along for this blast of the past.
Ray doesn’t think it’s him -- “If it is, wow, has he changed!” -- then I happen upon details that show it clearly is. Dates, places, people.
Ray helpfully adds another “Wow” followed by “I never knew you dated someone with such a big nose.”
Thank you, Ray. Now please leave. This is my memory lane.
OK fine. I found Jack. Now what?
I think maybe I could wait it out a couple of weeks, the holidays will be over, and my need to collect the past will have passed.
Or since it is the holidays, I could make an exception. I could be a little less worried about reaching out and what that means, and a little more willing to honor the missing characters who have left a spark, a mark -- that have provided the fun, the lessons, the laughs, the earliest connections, the memories that have somehow congealed into my personal, though sometimes icky, history.
Really, in our world, should any amount of love, whatever the definition, be squandered?
Or should the memories go back into the album with the old hippy pictures? Should I let Jack rest barefoot in those bellbottom jeans forever?
Perhaps these are too any questions, too much dillydallying even for the silly, frilly holidays.
Only a short time left to ponder.