The drive back from Portland is not just a drive back from Portland, it’s every drive you’ve ever made.

It’s the roadtrips with the family, the one you made to the Redwoods, the one with a girlfriend in the late ‘90s.

And on a moody Sunday morning when there’s no one else around you can lose yourself in the memories of all the places you’ve been and disappear into the past.

Because the past is a predictable place, you’ve been there. There are no surprises, no unknowns.

To relive the past is a pretend life, a way of fanning out our lives in patterns of metaphor, this vs. that.

That walk in the park is not just a walk in the park. It’s every walk you’ve been taking for years, the same walk.

The Sunday night dinner with your mother-in-law. The annual trip to the Jersey shore. The morning sun, the evening bath.

Every time you write.

To remember is to relive, and there is so much more to your life than you will ever remember.

But if there is one thing to remember, it’s this: the past is alive.

It’s not just a drive back from Portland, it’s every drive you’ve ever made.

Categories: Poetry, prose, writing

Tags: existentialism, Poetry, prose