what does it mean to move on?
"Is memory the best eternity we can make? The only?"
Is it to heal your heart until the pain leaves? Is it to unlearn all the instincts you acquired in love, like how you think of them all the time and buy them things and tell them all about your day? Is it all of the above, or something else entirely?
One oft-neglected aspect of moving on is filling the void left behind. My love took up a lot of space, not just in my heart and head but also in my schedule and in my room. Taking down all her gifts and trinkets was hard enough, but seeing the emptiness they leave behind hurts even more. And now I have a few extra hours every week, time I once would have craved, but I can hardly muster up the energy to get out of bed and take advantage of them.
I've spent a lot of time in the past weeks leaning hard on my friends for support, and while I've been extremely touched by all the kind words and countless hours people have given me, it never feels like enough. I can try to fill my schedule with as many distractions as I can but at the end of the day my thoughts always creep in: the anger of betrayal, nagging self-doubt, haunting memories turned sour, and crippling loneliness. You can't dress a bullet wound with Band-Aids.
Yesterday at dinner I watched a young couple around my age leave the restaurant and walk to their car, holding hands all the way. When the man opened the door to let his girlfriend in, I felt a wave of bittersweetness emanate in me so strongly I couldn't speak for the rest of the meal. I thought of the times I had done the same, and desperately tried to turn off the montage of memories playing before my eyes to no avail. Is this what David Foster Wallace meant in This is Water?
(...) teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about “the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.
I hope so. Because I'm tired of getting totally hosed and just want the pain to end.