Easter Thoughts

I suppose anyone has regrets. Can you really go through life without them? To be free of regrets is to either have an enviable outlook on life grounded in the existential absence of moral value or to have lived in such a timid, removed way as to done nothing of note.

That being said, I don't know if I could pinpoint any exact regret. There is no single moment where I wish I had done it differently; vague notions of turns made, steps taken that have led me down entirely different avenues, leaving me nostalgic for old paths and remembered companions.

When I attempt to truly inspect life and my own influence on it, I picture a road. Most likely I'm merely adapting the symbol most religions use - a road, a path, some sort of avenue upon which one travels. The straight and narrow. Except my life as I see it, is upon an unpaved road, perhaps just a game path. Parts of the path are completely windblown, lost to dust and the inevitable creep of nature. Parts of the path are paved with clear, precise lines, painted, obvious indications of expected behavior. The path changes as inevitably as life must. Throughout the length of the path, other equally mysterious tributaries branch off, limbs of a tree careening away from the trunk. And without conscience thought, these are taken, and a new road looms, the same one I've always trod down but life-changing different.

Upon each path, I meet fellow sojourners. Each is on their own journey. Often I will come into contact with a similar burning soul, one who speaks back in an unknowable, untranslatable language. Perhaps hatred ensues, or love, or envy, or friendship. The human exchange of emotion and experience. Briefly we travel together, paths running parallel, steps falling in unison. Irrevocably the road diverges, a turn calls out and I must take it or sacrifice my own journey in return for theirs - or more optimistically, begin a new, shared journey.

Perhaps this is love.

Unsure of where I'm going with this except that it's what's on my mind. An open keyboard and a willingness to write usually brings out these melancholy and meandering thoughts. I've also noticed I'm a chronic over-user of alliteration.

Regardless, the night finds me drinking chamomile tea in the hopes that it will counteract the cup of coffee I finished an hour earlier, the sounds of Ryan Adams flit through the laptop's speakers, and innumerable pages wait to be read. Be well.