The human emotion can be a quite equally enjoyable and disturbing thing. It can also be remarkably unpredictable. From one moment to the next, you can suddenly find yourself going from the east side to the west side. From the north to the south. And on this clamourous and bustling Wednesday, I found myself near Stadshagen experiencing just that.
The underground (the subway) can bring many delights as well as heavy feelings. I usually ride on the green line. That's my line. It's always been my line since I've lived in Stockholm. It was over a year ago that I lived on the other end of the line that I do today, so needless to say I don't venture over that way so often. But today, I had some business to tend to, and I had to go surging down the green line deeper than I have become accustomed to traveling.
That particular end of the green line holds a lot of pain for me. It is where I first lived when I moved to Stockholm. It reminds me of the reason I came to Sweden: For love. So as the subway crossed over the water, and from the window I could see the door to what used to be my love and my home, I was a bit taken aback by how much it stirred in me. It probably wouldn't have affected me as much had I not also passed the stop before the one I describe. The stop before it is also a place I lived a year ago. It is also the place where two of my dearest friends lived. Unfortunately, one of them moved over a year ago back to her home country, and the other friend tragically died just this past May. So as the subway train came to a stop, and the doors opened, and I looked upon the platform that I used to traverse so often, it was hard not to see and hear the ghosts of a time passed, of a friend lost, and of the wonderful and the rough times 3 friends all had there together not so long ago.
I found myself struggling not to cry, and I was doing just fine, but the next stop on the line was the place that started it all, and even worse was that I could see the front door to my old home from the window. Even more memories forcefully resurfaced, and I found myself in a rather fragile state.
Most of the time, I manage to keep moving. I try not to think too much about the fact that I'm pretty much wandering around alone in outer space over here.The only thing familiar to me is the unfamiliarity, which I've become quite used to. Regular solitude, tempered by reckless socializing have been my only means of surviving. The essence of home and all that lies therein has become a faint and distant memory that seems to not concern anyone, and I have even marginalized such thoughts myself.
Sometimes everything seems like a really bad dream that I can't wake up from. It is difficult to not want to rewind the past almost 6 years of my life and make different choices. The best we can do, as we all know, is learn from our mistakes. I've always tried to forgive people, no matter how badly they have hurt me, because I know I am only human myself and we all have our limitations. I've always felt that anything can be healed, and that pride is the ultimate killer. Fear would run an insanely close second to that. Pride and Fear are a match made in hell, and they will always bear Loss as an offspring.
I have a birthday soon. I believe I will spend the year of my new age exploring and learning more about those three things: Pride, Fear, and Loss. I will learn all that I can so that I will be able to give more to the people in my life, and so that I might spare my heart any of the bullets from those three, quickly-drawn weapons...
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