I've told you I like to smell like fall, haven't I? Well, I have a confession to make... that I may have already made but I'm going to re-confess, if so. I like to smell like fall... I like to smell like fall so much that I use a home fragrance oil made by Bath & Body Works as perfume. I'm not even kidding. I know this is totally odd. It's called "Leaves" -though I would contend that it doesn't smell like leaves.. or at least not just like leaves. It smells sooooo good. So, if you are around me and you think, "My, I smell pumpkins and firepits and cinnamon and fall. What could that be?"
It's me.
Plus I read somewhere that men find pumpkin pie smell attractive... so that kills two birds with a single stone. Attractive to them and comforting to me. No joke. Pumpkin pie. Check it yo.
You know what's weird? Seeing someone you used to have a crush on. I had this experience a while back. I had a crush on this guy a long time ago... and then I ran into him and it was surreal. Let me just say, that when I crush I'm all in. I turn all of my impressive arsenal of detail noticing to 11 and I focus. I focus like it's going out of style. Then eventually the crush wanes and I move on... but not before I have committed every gesture, every facial expression, every mannerism to memory. Which is fine if you never see them again... but if you ever have a conversation with the guy, let me tell you it is weird, because all the things you'd forgotten that you once noticed, you now see and, boy howdy, is it distracting. You suddenly feel like you are in an episode of the Twilight zone, and you can't even carry on a decent conversation for the level of meta your brain is undergoing.
I missed the 29th. Last month for the first time, I missed the 29th. It was a day that came and went without my noticing... It might have been because the week before was so hellish, or it might have been that I was distracted, but I missed it... and I don't feel bad... It's not like I don't miss Nathan, or think of him every day... but I don't want to have dark days. I don't want to have days where I feel obligated to be stuck in sadness. I missed the 29th and honestly when I realized it, it was a bit of a relief.
People are starting to forget, I've noticed. People are starting to forget that their lives have been touched by death... I mean sure, the people on the fringe have been forgetting for a while, but friends are starting to forget. Young people joke about dying because it's so foreign a concept- something that only happens to the elderly. And we are starting to slip back into that mode... I don't mind it, except that in some ways it makes it all feel like a dream. I could barely believe sometimes when Nathan was alive that he'd chosen me... and now without him here as proof... it's so much easier to feel like it was a dream. So much of me and who I am was invested in Nathan... so much of my life and my time was invested in him, and sometimes it makes me scared of wanting to invest in other people. If I put all my time investment in one basket what will happen if it doesn't work out, or if we stop being friends or heaven forbid, someone else dies... I just realized I've got senior-itis (what high school seniors get during spring semester)... only it's about the life version... and I'm only a freshman.
It took me three years to stop mourning my niece, Lynette, and around four to stop mourning a girl who was quite precious to me. I know what you mean about the dream-feeling; for both of these people, who were so close to me, I find myself wondering if the years together were real, or if I'm making parts of it up with false memories. All I have are some pictures, and in the case of Elisabetha, I lost even those over the years.
ReplyDeleteIf it was a dream, though, it was certainly a pleasant one. And I'll hold on to the lessons I learned from them and how they changed me, and in those changes know it was real.
I don't think we forget. The memories just become less painful, and we can remember with quiet pleasure (if a somewhat melancholy pleasure) instead of sharp sadness.