Remember when...

Music and autumn are the ultimate catalysts for nostalgia.

Music brings your youth back in floods. There are those songs that you used to play over and over again, so much so that you know every single note, every last exhalation and subtle finger scratch on guitar strings. They were so important to you, because at the time you had discovered an accurate articulation of what was swirling around inside of you. You don't play them often anymore, because they no longer necessarily appropriately reflect your daily inner soundtrack, but when they come on unannounced, everything, every single little detail comes flooding back and you feel, momentarily, exactly the same as you felt five, ten, twenty or more years ago.

The difference that is so striking to me is the difference between how much we felt then and how much we allow ourselves to feel now.

Remember how young we were? Remember how old we felt?

Your first love was so unadulterated in its intensity that you swore that no one could have ever loved anyone like this before. And then when he broke your heart, you felt like you would die, because no one could possibly survive such pain. Remember how much it hurt? Do you remember how it took over everything, every last part of your day-- how you couldn't get away from it, how acute the experience was? Now as adults we've experienced loss so well beyond the scope of what we understood then, but we don't get to let that pain out. Instead we silently hold it close to our hearts and really push it aside as much as we can so that we can put on a good face for the world. We no longer get to embrace and express our pain.

(Note: Nov 2012: I don't remember when I wrote this. I know there was more. I know it involved the smell of autumn.)