edshots

Last night, I was going through some of the boxes that I had collected over the years of papers and such. I was going through one of them and I found some letters that I had gotten about 20 years ago.

A (big) percentage of them were from the girl (young lady?) that I was crazy about at the time. Reading over them, I thought about how , although I didn't think about her often, I missed her. I know that part of that is missing the person I was 20 years ago, but I think the reason is different. I think it is because back then I still was an absolute romantic. I believed in "happily ever after" and "true Love." I still do, although not as religiously as I used to. It twanged at my heartstrings as I read some of the things that I know meant a lot more 20 years ago than they do today.

I've occasionally thought about her since those days. Usually I hope that she did better than I did in life, love and other things. Occasionally I hope she regrets dumping me. If I ran into her today, assuming either of us recognized the other, I would still feel all the "love" I did then. It just wouldn't be the same love that it was then.

Back then, we talked about forever. Now we would talk about since then.
A small, but very important difference.

Romance is talking about what may be. Life is talking about what is.

No wonder I prefer being a romantic.