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By Foolish Date: 2002 Aug 26 Comment on this Work [[2002.08.26.12.30.27268]] |
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At the party to which only regrets are invited, our pasts cluster on the front stoop, whispering If only or What if and growing smaller with each telling until we can squeeze through the tiny door like the proverbial camel through the needle's eye, a task made possible by sloughing off the humped burden of riches. So we check it all at the door, our late-model joys, the second husband and children, golden friends with their promises to stand by, and enter alone. Once inside, we don't lack for company. Everyone we ever failed is there, and those who failed us. Mr. Wrongs fill the mirrored hallway, ghosts of first spouses mull around the table. The platters are full. We feast on half-baked schemes. Our scars gleam, and all the fine white stitches. If after all these years the slipper still fits, don't wear it. In the scheme of things, this shame is nothing. At the party to which only regrets are invited, we meet ourselves coming and going, like the man in the childhood riddle whose life multiplied seven times sevenfold by those he met along the way. In truth, he was the lone traveler. All along, the answer was one. |