“Everything
comes and goes” sang Joni Mitchell on Down
to You from her 1974 double platinum album Court and Spark, “marked by lovers and styles of clothes”. And, anyone who’s blown out as many birthday
candles as I knows this full well. It’s
a constant stream of interactions, this thing we call life; a highway with
innumerable intersections, clover-leafs, and exit ramps.
As
I’ve alluded to in other writings, many of our relationships in this “day and
age” are transient. Fleeting and withering,
our acquaintances often take flight like leaves on the Autumn breeze. The bff
from high school, the co-worker from two jobs back, the former neighbor that
promised they’d keep in touch, sometimes gradually, other times it’s a here
today, gone tomorrow scenario. Like
gears in a cosmic machine we mesh, then shift to mesh with other gears.
Sometimes
we “grow apart”, as its generally phrased, other times we “don’t have time” for
those in our periphery any longer. And
on occasion, we just come to a place where we simply no longer see eye to eye.
But
everyone you’ve ever known has touched you in some way, and you are who you are
– to a large degree – because of those interactions. We are social creatures, and we should never
underestimate the impact those whom we’ve been privileged to know have left on
our lives, and we on theirs.
If
I may be allowed a second lyrical reference, Billy Joel exemplified my point in
his song Say Goodbye to Hollywood: So
many faces in and out of my life, some will last, some will be just now and then.
So
treasure the lives that have touched yours, if only for a time and a season,
and know you have also touched theirs.
If
only for a time and a season.
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