The One That Got Away.

I had this vivid dream the other night, and I couldn't wake up - didn't want to wake up - even when I was supposed to help a friend move. And so I selfishly willed myself not to wake up. (Sorry Parkie.) It's not often that I have dreams, let alone remember them. But for some reason, I can't seem to shake this one, mostly because of who was in it. If ever there was a one that got away, this would be him. And I didn't want him to disappear.

I try not to let myself ruminate on boys past, and I often don't. With the exception of one. I suppose it was unlikely that we would have ever met, were it not for a single mutual friend. And even the memories that I have are random. A trip here, a storied confession there. Random questions and random locations, and me being ever so clueless. Knowing, yet not knowing. Denial, perhaps, sprinkled with a dash (okay, more than a dash) of ill-fated timing.

But when I explained my theory on timing, I had a friend call me out on this: "What you're doing is romanticizing the fact that you screwed up and were too immature to see what was right in front of you," he said. "Don't relegate this to timing - it's all on you."

Maybe he's right.

But maybe, you can't help what life stage you happened to be in and when, and it happens that way for a reason.

I'm not entirely convinced I believe in 'the one that got away.' Rather, I'm not convinced I want to believe it. Truth be told, it sounds completely one-sided - a creation in retrospect following a need to assign significance to events and possibilities past. I don't know that I like the idea of that. I guess I just don't like the idea of regrets, period, however nebulous. It is in some ways nothing more than a justification of a lack of foresight. And where is the closure in that?

Yeah, I wonder. I suppose I'll always wonder. Who knows if it would have even worked? Maybe, maybe not. Although it's been a while, I'm surprised to find he's still there, hiding out in the recesses of my mind, resurfacing in fleeting memories where I felt more alive than I can remember.

But things happen for a reason. And I'm a firm believer of that.