Regret

I hope I don’t wind up turning this blog into a summary of the Seven Deadly Sins and How I Loved Them because that would be too much for even me to take. But I do want to comment on what strikes me as being one of the Big Unchange-ables in life – the fact that one can’t undo that which is done. The wages of mistake are failure and regret and I’m feeling a whole bunch of that now.

If I had a magical pony that could grant me any wish, I think it would be to have the forgiveness of those I’ve wronged, however large or slight. After being granted their grace, I would want to pick up at a new place with them, the place I intended to go in the first place but somehow, due to arrogance, ignorance, pride or foolishness, lost my way and they, being trusting, or hearing what they wanted to hear, depending on how cynical you are, came right along.

There are a lot of people I really miss: Jim, Mark, Glen, C, S, Jane and even Georgia. I miss my kid and the hope of a family and I regret that I couldn’t make it work like it should. I regret that although my wife is insane, – and I regret that, too – she was right about quite a few things. I regret that no matter what I would have done with her that she would never care about me because she isn’t capable and I regret that she will do the same to my kid. I regret the fact that I can’t be like other people and instead have to struggle daily with the basics just to get by or be sentenced to a lifetime of drug therapy that would make me a eunuch. Heck, I’m still suffering from post-SNRI side-effects.

I regret not taking more chances with my self and I regret succumbing to fear. Really – what was the worst that could happen? Sure, some bad things happened and they hurt very much, crippled my lifestyle and such but not taking the risks meant me quelling the possibilities and I regret that the most since those chances are gone.

Mostly, I regret not believing that it’ll be alright. Oh, it will probably be somewhat okay but in the end, I’ve squandered people, opportunities, family, love and life itself. Therefore, I regret that I am what my Uncle Paul would call “that poor Schmuck.”

So, I’ve been given myriad opportunities and basically pitched them into the sea. Must be that ADD or something. And now, the opportunities are gone, all used up. I’ve put myself past all that will be good because I don’t know how to handle it, I guess, and those chances should go to someone who can do something sustaining with them. It would be best for all concerned.

I can ask Glen to forgive me for not listening, for giving in to my ego, but she’d be right in not hearing that. If I had the patience (see the last f$*&#ing blog entry) maybe that would have worked out. I’m sure she could care less if I were living or dead, but I think about her often enough to know that I regret not having sat down that one night seventeen or so years ago and not budged until we decided on a next step and then another and another until we got to a point where we agreed on a direction, until she felt that I was hearing her.

I failed D and my kid my not recognizing that D was insane from the start, that she was a black sheep from a family of black sheep. I regret trusting her, allowing my ego to bloom under the power of a 23-year old, until she manipulated and controlled everything I did and even what I thought to the point of my Inner Mother saying NO as she did to my father thirty years ago. Only now do I realize that my attraction to her was that she is my father and that I very much wanted him to give me the love and validation I could only get from him. He didn’t fork it over and neither did she. So, I regret not seeing and not being circumspect as, at 32, I should have been.

I regret not being totally honest with those who trusted me and I regret that I can’t ever undo that lack of honesty.

So, what do I do here? Suicide? That doesn’t sound like fun, although I am pretty damn sad. Just carry on and do better next time? I don’t feel like I deserve another chance just now and besides, the effect is cumulative and I grow more gun shy every minute. Another pony analogy – the gun-shy part.

Well, then, I guess I’ll just have to be patient. It doesn’t cost anything, so, why not?

In the meantime, I am sorry. Sorry for missing all of you, sorry that I didn’t take the other path with you, sorry that you’re gone, all of you, cause it could have been fun, all this time, together. And I wouldn’t have regretted that, no, not at all.