Hindsight

[lydy]

So, imagine that you had a Bohemian, libidinous past. In your early twenties, you meet a wonderful man, marry, have three kids, and return to the religion in which you were raised. Possibly, this change to a conservative lifestyle is at least partly a response to finding your previous rebellious lifestyle unsatisfactory. Many years later, an old flame calls. To complicate matters, she's a, well, she, and so is twice a sin, once as a pre-marital affair, and twice as a same-sex relationship. Even if, or perhaps especially if, you have feelings about her, it is an uncomfortable situation. Another ten or so years go by, your life has become infinitely more complicated, and the affection you felt for her is even older and more faded, the church more conservative, and the taboo against same-sex relationships strongly reinforced -- and she tries to make contact, again. Frankly, this isn't the sort of conversation you really want to have, at the moment. Or ever. The absolute best it can be is painful, and the worst is, well, pretty unimaginably horrible.

No, I don't think I'll write a letter, or send email, or anything else. I hadn't thought of things from her side. I most emphatically hadn't thought of myself as an old regret. I forgot that that was the way it works. I mean, sure, now I'm a sin, I can dig that. But I'd forgotten that the whole repentance thing would reach backwards. I'd been thinking of conversion as, like, a new beginning. It's not, though, and I should have remembered that. I'm probably as welcome as a bull in a China shop. You know, it's embarrassing to not have thought of all of this, before. Even without some of the more tragic underpinnings, I should have been more careful. Boy, ain't hindsight something?

Comments

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

Snort.

I bet I still have an email from you to me that boggles my mind, years later... and for that matters, touches on you, me, and Lydy.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I bet I still have an email from you to me that boggles my mind, years later... and for that matters, touches on you, me, and Lydy.

September, 1996?

K.

[lydy.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Do I want to know?

[joelrosenberg.livejournal.com]

There are some things man is not meant to know; it may be different for women.

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

Very likely. The one where you explained how a casual comment I'd made to Lydy reached your ears. I can't seem to find a copy...