leaving the past behind

Now that I've spent more than enough time contemplating the Google Maps street-level view of my old happy home, and wasted enough hours mooning and moping to the melancholy sound of Sinatra and the Hi-Lo's '50's version of "I'll Never Smile Again," and having determined that the past is dead and gone and never coming back, and that I'm neither dead nor dying, and will probably be somewhere on this earth, working and active and cultivating relationships with other humanoid carbon units for many years to come...

I've resolved myself to the fact that all we ever have is the here and now, which unwinds minute by minute and day by day into an uncertain but somewhat calculable future, and the knowledge that if we're going to make the best of it we need to let go of that past, no matter how seemingly happy and wonderful and joyful and fulfilling we remember it as being. And maybe it wasn't really that wonderful anyhow; maybe I'm just misremembering. Come to think of it, I also recall being frequently exhausted in those days, but I don't remember things like that as easily as I remember all the good stuff.

Tempus fugit...but don't let it fly away from you because you're looking over your shoulder at what's behind; and keep your eye on the ball.