My Real Memoir
She was there, and yet she wasn’t. My suddenly-ex-girlfriend Dar handed me her apartment key, and said, “Well, bye.” I leaned in for a long kiss, hoping it might re-ignite something, but she cut it short. To keep things “clean and uncomplicated,” she’d moved all of her possessions out the day before I flew home. Clean, maybe. Uncomplicated, no.
The year before, I’d said I “might not be in love” with her anymore, and she’d begged me not to leave. Now, as I told her I still loved her, it was she who nodded, eyes glistening slightly, and slowly walked away.
That was the last time I ever saw her.
We were lost when we found each other, and still hadn’t found our way, but we were lost together. And that can feel like being found. For a while.
At first, I’d thought Darlene was the most sophisticated creature on the planet. But then she sat in a grocery cart and laughed as I pushed her around an empty parking lot. And after that, she was just Dar. The lost girl had met the lost boy. We didn’t know where we were going, but we were going there together.
She had a hole in her heart, my lost girl, made by a college professor who replaced her innocence with drugs and a hurriedly-aborted baby. But she called it “life experience” and refused to see the hole.
We moved in together. I got a job that required travel, and she started working at a local hospital. Then, while I was away, Dar met a handsome, world-weary doctor. And suddenly we were done.
Four years later, I called her. Things had changed, I said. I wasn’t lost anymore. Darlene laughed, called me simple, and said she too had changed. She’d embraced The New Age: “I am the center of my universe!” she told me (she’d finally found a safe place). “And you are the center of your universe.”
“No thanks,” I replied, “I don’t want to live in that universe.”
Then she then urged me to leave California because “all of the best psychics” were prophesying an earthquake that would destroy everything west of the Rockies!
“I’ll be OK,” I replied.
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because it’s not going to happen in my universe.”
She abruptly ended the conversation, and we never spoke again. I’ve regretted that gotcha ever since.
Thirty years later, I found her Facebook page. Her most recent post warned of an imminent earthquake. There were no more entries. Did it happen in her universe? I wondered acerbically, but checked the unworthy thought.
Then I found her obituary. I don’t know how she died, but she had, in fact, moved east of the Rockies. The obituary said she was a kind and supportive member of the New Age community who “lit up every room she walked into.” I believe it.
I never knew the woman she became. But I knew and loved the lost girl she’d been. And I pray that the God of all universes reached out to her during that time and prepared her to come home…
To the safe place he’d made just for her.
My Real Memoir is a series. To read the next one, click here.
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Well said, Mitch. The things we put ourselves through when we were young. My wife, Momo and found each other again, twenty years ago. We had been a pair in 1970-73, and went our separate ways. Too young and also stupid, but it has worked out for the better.
All’s well that ends well, right, Phil?
Right-o, Mitch.
This is a sweet story from back in the day when love and relationships were becoming more carefree. Apparently, Dar just wasn’t your soulmate. 🙂
No. I fell in love a number of times in the past, Nancy. But looking back, I wouldn’t want to spend my life with anyone but Trudy.
Actually, in my universe, that was a pretty good answer you had there…
<3
“We were lost when we found each other, and still hadn’t found our way, but we were lost together. And that can feel like being found. For a while.”
One of the truest paragraphs I’ve read in a while.
Thank you, my friend. (May I ask your name, btw?)
Ken. No Barbie jokes, please.
Got it. I grew up with “Sing along with Mitch” jokes, Ken, so I understand.
This is beautifully written 🥺
Thank you, Rojie.
You’re welcome
At least you tried and reached out to her after a long time. You cared about her. 💕
Beautifully crafted with Mitch magic.
Aw, thank you, Nancy.
A sad discovery at the end but such is part of life. This is sweet: “… after that, she was just Dar”
<3
A sad story…
You capture emotions so wonderfully, Mitch. Thank you for sharing, and may Darlene be happy and at peace in “the safe place he made just for her”.
Thank you, and bless you, Damyanti.
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