Today The Lounge is being hosted by Tegan at
Musings of the Misguided.
The subject is 'Your Best Achievement' ...
I don't know - I've been struggling to blog for a bit now - I've no idea why, it's certainly not for the lack of things to talk about, it's more a kind of lethargy that hits me after a few sentences but I'm hoping that's just temporary.
So, what's MY best achievement?
My children? Going back to college when my eldest son was young to take the A levels I missed? Stopping smoking? Yes to all of those and more but, on a deeply personal level I think it would have to be learning to trust in love again.
Believe me, it's something that I couldn't have imagined I would ever allow myself to do at one point. I was done with entrusting my heart to someone else only to have that trust broken and my heart shattered.
I NEVER wanted to go there again!
And then he came out of the past, and he stayed, and he made me feel worth it.
I don't know if it will last forever - I'm just grateful for the now.
Surfer Dude
I remember the very first time I saw him. I don't know why I would. There was nothing particularly significant about that day. I'm guessing it was a Saturday but only because I was sitting in the window of a cafe on the High Street drinking tea and chatting idly with a friend as we watched the world pass by outside.
I think it was Summer time. I would say that it must have been as he was wearing shorts and a tee shirt but over the years I've come to realise that his wardrobe though season dependant to a degree (and, incidentally, 'to a degree' is one of those phrases he uses over and over, he will often end a sentence with the disclaimer 'to a degree' almost as though while you may not entirely believe what he has said you must believe that there is an element of fact in it 'to a degree') the colder months just bring longer shorts and a layering of tee shirts worn with 8 hole Docs and thick woolly socks in a variety of soft coloured marled yarns.
In those days he wore his hair shorter. It fell over his collar and forehead in a riot of corn coloured curls, the sides shaved high above his ears, his deep blue eyes edged with black eyeliner. The Docs then had 10 holes and laced half way up his calves. He wore mostly black and only the brightness of his hair belied this post punk depressionist persona.
He was SO god damned beautiful he made my heart pause and then restart with a thump that made it hard to breath.
I don't know how old we were, I wish I could remember. I was 19, maybe 20? He was a few years older.
As he walked past he waved to my friend and glanced at me. He looked away and then paused and looked back. Our eyes held for a split second and I knew. I knew that one day I would touch that golden hair and look again into those eyes.
Our paths crossed from time to time over the years. Our friends combined and mingled like those circles you draw in Maths. Two different sections that meet and overlap, separating time after time but always coming back together.
I don't remember the second time we met or the first time we kissed, how could I NOT remember that?
I do remember the many times we seemed to be in the same place at the same time. The coffees that we shared while he told me of his adventures. The first time he took me to the farm and we sat in the sun on the lawn. He sat behind me and I lent back resting on his chest, his hands on my shoulders, my face turned up to the warmth. I remember walking through town and hearing a horn beep and him yell 'Sarah, over here' - I'd turn and see him smiling and waving at me from his bright red Jeep or a Beach Buggy or a Landrover splatter with mud from a weekends off roading or hill climb. I'd run across the road and climb in. In those days I wore my jeans so tight it was an achievement to get into anything he drove as nothing seemed to have doors that opened and we would take off and just drive and talk, it was always sunny ....
He would deliver me home windswept and happy with a promise to ring me sometime, and he did. Every now and then when I hadn't seen him for a while he would call and we would meet, drink coffee and talk and laugh.
And then life got so busy for us both and for many years we hardly saw each other just occasionally our paths would cross and we would stop and talk about our lives and our sun filled past.
We both fell in love more than once with other people. We built our own lives and we planned our futures.
We saw those futures slip away and our paths change and, when I thought I'd come to the end of my path I heard a shout 'Sarah, over here' and there he was. His hair may have been a little longer, the shaved sides and the eyeliner long gone but the shorts and the tee shirt and those 8 hole Docs with the marled socks, they were still there, a comforting constant in an ever changing world.
He made me see that the path hadn't ended, I wasn't standing on the edge of a precipice about to fall. I was at a corner, a corner so tight that it wound back on itself, a corner that ran parallel with the past and back into the sunshine.
He walked me home that day and, as we stood at the end of my road under the light of a street lamp he touched my face gently and said, 'there's always been something between us'.
Our friendship spans more than half my life time. It's taken us such a long time to get here. I've fought it, run from it and tried to push it away because I've been so afraid to believe in it and too afraid to let go of the past because dammit, that might mean the past meant NOTHING! And, if I believed that then what do I have to show for most of my life?
But it didn't mean nothing. The people I met along the way have shaped the person I am. I have cared for them, they are a part of me.
I have loved them SO damned much it's ripped me apart!!!
But they aren't here.
They choose not to be.
Some are still friends, some want to be enemies and some are now just strangers with whom I share memories.
How did that happen ....
He has taught me that it's ok to be sad for the past - 'there's a girl I should have been kinder to ....' But that ultimately things happen for a reason - 'there's always been something between us ... '.
Sometimes I look at him and he is SO god damned beautiful he makes my heart pause and then restart with a thump that made it hard to breath ...
