Stones In My Pocket
We were friends ten thousand years ago, back in the early 2000s. We’d met through Friendster, that early social media site, before the term “social media” had ever been trotted out. Connecting with people online was still something new, and it was fun and a bit of a thrill to connect with someone far away over shared interests: music, photography, books, kitsch.
I was in New York at the time, and she was in Pennsylvania. Not that far, not really, measured against the size of the country, the size of the world. I worked nights, she worked days, but we had enough overlap that we would chat regularly throughout the week. She would send me photos of the stained glass she was making and selling, and I would send her photos of my city and the writing I was doing. We talked about getting together at some point in the future, because in the language of cartography, we were essentially neighbors.
She met a boy, and I met a girl. Even with that, we kept talking to one another, because we had a connection that wasn’t tilted in the direction of the romantic, so there was nothing lost between us while we each muddled about with our local loves.
My relationship did as most do, and fizzled away into nothingness. Hers became rocky and difficult, for reasons that are not mine to reveal. She became pregnant, and though her partner wasn’t everything she wanted him to be, she was delighted by the child growing inside her. She reveled in the role of soon-to-be mother. She said that I should come to Pennsylvania and visit, to see how big she was growing, to see how thick her hair was getting, how healthy her skin looked. I told her I would try to get down as soon as I could, but my car was a rusted death trap, and my job was eating all my time, and I was perpetually terrified of my tiny bank account.
The baby grew bigger, and she had a scare, one that made her doctor put her on bed rest. She hated being trapped there, under the blankets, not allowed to go further than her bathroom. I’m on a leash, she said. I’m going insane over here. You should come down and see me. I’m so big, I’m going to pop.
My car. My job. My bank account.
A short time later, her water broke in the bed to which she was leashed. Her not-perfect partner loaded her into his car, and they went to the hospital, driving at a sensible speed, no panic, only enthusiasm. The delivery was long, but not unreasonably so. There were no dramatic complications, no problems that needed to be overcome. She gave birth to a perfect little boy. She held him, loved him, and then he was taken away to be cleaned before his return to her.
She died while the baby was away. Blood clot. Travelled from her leg to her lungs, killing her so quickly, so cruelly.
There are miles and miles between what her son lost with her death and what I did. I am not trying to measure the weights of our respective losses. He has lost the most, and it is no contest.
What I am telling you is that there are moments in your life where you need to decide if you are willing to drive the rusted car with the busted heater and the oil leak, or to call out sick from work during the busy season, or to eat an overdraft fee in order to fill your tank to take you down the highway a few hundred miles to see a friend.
If life is a lake, memories are the boat that takes you from one shore to the other.
Regrets are stones in your pockets as you fight to swim.
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