Today I enjoyed yogurt & berries with OJ, with a friend. It was a beautiful day in city, everyone was out and about. While I was engaged in our conversation, I couldn't help but be distracted by the pedestrian traffic outside the large windows. I watched couples strolling by, enjoying the weather hand in hand. No, I wasn't overcome with bitterness or envy or even jealousy, when I saw so many lovebirds. But, I couldn't help but feel a certain sense of wonder, perhaps nostgalia, perhaps even a strange longing.
The wonder was, at the moment I enjoyed yogurt and berries, where was he? Was he enjoying the stellar Sunday that I, and so many New Yorkers were? Was he out and about, enjoying the sun, enjoying the weather, enjoying the typical Sunday brunch? If I knew him at all (which, I'm not sure I even did), he was among many, engaged in interesting discussion, fully immersed in the moment, looking as beautiful as ever.
Nostalgia is defined as a yearning for the past. The word is a learned formation of a Greek compound, meaning "returning home", a Homeric word, and ἄλγος (álgos), meaning "pain, ache". That pretty much surmised my sentiments: pain & ache. As I enjoyed brunch, I couldn't help but long for two weeks ago, when we at brunch on a beautiful Sunday, very similar to today. As I ate the yogurt & berries, I contemplated how delicious it was and how he would have loved it. I reflected back to how so much had changed in the past two weeks. It saddened me.
I experienced a sense of Longing . I couldn't help but wonder, momentarily about all of the various things I could have said and done differently. Unrealistically, I longed to go back to that "moment," I somehow concluded I "lost" him. I contemplated what I would have done differently. I longed to go back to the Saturday we walked across the Brooklyn bridge. I longed to go back to the Mexican restaurant in the West Village. I longed to go back to first laying eyes on him, where I felt butterflies everywhere . I longed to go back to the place where he courted me, where I reminded myself that I would only take this at face value and "wanted nothing serious." My mind was inundated.
It's strange how the mind works. It's stranger how the mind works when sad. A simple brunch, on a beautiful Sunday, surrounded by a friend, had prompted so many emotions and thoughts. We may be the city that never sleeps and with that, can also be a mind that never sleeps.
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