Normally, my past STAYS
there... in the past. Oh, occasionally something will bring out a brief
memory of an event or a person, remembered with some fondness perhaps...
or less ... or even with pretty even neutrality. I seldom deliberately
revisit the past, more than the past year, and even that is on landmark
personal occasions. One is coming up soon; we moved onto our land in
mid-August, 4 years ago. That brings up memories of the first garden
tilling, in September, by a hired tractor guy, the "first year garden"
which got totally lost in the weeds and yet yielded a surprise lot of
carrots and potatoes and other goodies when I could hunt them down...
and last year's freak July 4 hailstorm that pretty much totaled it all.
I'm fairly connected to the land and many of my memories are rooted
there.
But people... they flow and eddy around me like
leaves in a stream mostly. I honestly connect with very few and,
considering that some folks I know are still in contact with -- daily
even -- and friends with folks from their childhood it would appear that
my connections are more typically on the other end in length. I do not
have the foggiest idea of where my grade school friends are; I last saw
one when I was in college and we discovered nothing in common on that
visit. I have a good guess where my best friend from high school is, but
I did not see him for years after we graduated and went different
directions. We reconnected briefly in the 80s, and drifted apart again
after that. I generally do not succumb to curiosity to try to search out
old acquaintances on the Internet like many folks do, whether they
follow up with a contact or not. I do not regret my past or the people
in it, but they were then, and this is now.
When then was
now, I was focused there. Life was full and busy and interesting. Now, I
am still focused in the present, which remains full, busy and
interesting. Some threads weave in and out along the warp of my life;
growing things, building things, digging in the earth, working with
fiber, spinning, weaving, sewing, cooking, self-reliance and thrift.
Most of those threads, though, beyond cooking, self-reliance and thrift,
have not even been constant. I lived in the city without growing things
until I rediscovered house and windowsill plants, for example. I have
not sewn, other than to mend, for a year or more -- though I think that
will change soon as I need things I cannot find. Other "passions of the
time" have gone by the wayside. I no longer sit up into the wee hours
of the night in hopes of catching a celestial event; if it doesn't
happen at dusk or dawn, chances are good I'll miss it. I don't chase
UFOs or write poems or articles... Will some of those threads pick they
way back into the weave? Maybe the Norns know, but I do not.
People from the past, well they stay in the chapter in which they were written. typically. Until now.
Last
week I got a cryptic email from someone with the (relatively common)
first and last name of my first husband, from the early 70s. The mail
came into my hex business account, along with another the same day from
someone who found my old business listing on WitchVox. I know the source
of the latter, because it is a blind forward though that web site, for
security. The other did not reference our connection or my art, just a
desire to meet when he arrived in Maine in a week.
I have a
habit of replying to brief critic emails in like fashion (just ask K
about our first email exchange some time! LOL) but not sure if this was
actually the person I knew or someone with an accidentally identical
name who might be looking to commission a hex sign, I tried to be
polite. I still do not know how he made the connection, though I was
doing hexen, though in batik, back in that time period. I am honestly
not sure I will ask, though I have agreed to meet with him and his wife
in Bangor day after tomorrow (Wednesday) at Nicky's Diner. Even if the
house and farm were in order, I do not want to bring the past into this
space. No, there is no baggage nor animosity and there was none at the
time; we just didn't work out... young folks who got married and found
we had little of substance in common, I guess. We parted amicably and
that was that.
I have no desire to regain contact; I will
not venture to share much of substance of my current life, ask after his
connectivity on social media or the like. We will have lunch, I'll
politely wish them a good brief visit to my new home state and that will
be that.