Nostalgia, the danger of looking back…

I find myself awake yet again at 5am. But, at least this time I have had a few hours of sleep; not enough sleep, but adequate for now. I actually woke about an hour ago and could not fall back asleep because of the thoughts churning about in my head, thinking back…

I have found myself doing that a lot recently. Snippets of conversations on Twitter, a blog post that would remind me of something I had written in the past, the death of a friend last month; each occurrence took me back to another me.

I have found myself wondering what has happened to people that I have left behind. The friend who died was a former coworker. Our friendship existed mainly at work. It was casual, not real deep. But, you sometimes spend more time with your coworkers than you do your family. When she moved to a different department on a different shift, the friendship disappeared. We would occasionally see each other when she was coming to work as I was leaving. Just enough time for a quick hello and we were on our way. I was shocked to learn that she was gone, permanently gone. I learned of it in an email from my former manager. She was younger than me.

As of late, I have also been in search of my writing voice. Somewhere along the way I lost the words. I could no longer find voice to what I was feeling. I read the blogs of others and would be reminded of something I had written in the past. This would take me back into the archives of my Newsvine column. But in reading those old posts, it only served to bring back emotional pain. The driving force and inspiration of many of those articles was the pain I was going through at the time. To go back was to in a sense, relive that pain. To read the comments brought back the words of comfort of many online friends who lifted me up and helped me deal with whatever problem I was going through. But at the same time, those words from friends in the past left me wondering, where were they now?

I was pretty much forced to leave Newsvine as events and time constraints in real life did not allow me the opportunity to spend time there anymore. In my absence many of those friends left as well. People would come and go on the site continually. As people would leave, new friends would arrive and you would easily forget those who had departed. The last articles that I posted on Newsvine have not done well at all. I have become one of those who have been forgotten. I do still have a few loyal friends who show up when I post. And I do so appreciate them, but I also miss the companionship of the many who are now gone.

I am not sure anymore what the future holds for me, but who is? I have always tried to look forward and that attitude really saved me at times. Don’t dwell on the pain just keep moving. But, maybe it didn’t save me after all. I never really dealt with the emotional issues and the losses I experienced. Not necessarily because I didn’t want to deal with them, but because I just didn’t have the time. Events in my life kept pushing me forward. There was no time for reflection, until now.

But as I see it, at this moment, maybe I don’t need to reconcile the past as much as I need to learn to live with me as I am now. That might be in fact the true struggle.