“Regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention.”
What the hell is that even supposed to mean? I mean seriously. I get the whole “I did it my way” thing, but have you really listened to the lyrics to that song? I think poor Frank may have a few too many not-quite-legal substances when he came up with that one. Or quite possibly he didn’t actually write the song, but he must have been drunk on something every time he sang it because I haven’t heard stories of how he would stop in the middle of the song and say, “the fuck? ‘But through it all, when there was doubt, I ate it up and spit it out’? Which was it? Did I eat it or did I spit it out? I can’t sing under these conditions! Find me lyrics that make sense or I’m outta here.”
So regrets. I mostly don’t have them. I don’t regret things that I do, even if it’s been wrong and I’ve failed and I’ve had to start all over again. I think I would regret not doing things. I was looking back over this journal and I came across this entry from January when I said that for as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to live on the water, wanted to sit outside and write to the sound of the waves. I said “The older me doesn’t quite believe as much as the younger me did that anything is possible.” And here’s where I liken myself to crazy Frank and say, what the fuck was I thinking? I no longer believe that anything is possible?
I would like to go back in time and smack the ten-months-younger me in the head and tell her that as a matter of fact, I do now live on the water and I’m listening to the waves as I write this RIGHT THIS SECOND, so maybe ten-months-younger me shouldn’t be so smug and sighing and know it all about things. Maybe anything really is possible.
I still get depressed when I fail. But I know I’m going to fail sometimes. There’s something to be said for being safe and comfortable and knowing what’s coming next, but then there are times when you just say fuck it, I’m going for it. And sometimes it’s all you could have wanted and sometimes it’s unexpected joy and sometimes you fail, but even then, you end up somewhere you couldn’t have imagined, and you’re moving forward to a new place and maybe failure’s just another word for nothing left to lose. Or wait, that was freedom. Freedom’s another word for nothing left to lose. Failure must be that word for the beginning of something new.