Letter to my Ex

Visiting my prior life in California is a lot like seeing an old lover.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Actually, it’s complicated.

There is so much that is deeply familiar about you, and sucks me right back in time. Memories of you come from unexpected places, particularly when the senses are involved. The smell of jasmine with a hint of eucalyptus and damp earth. The soundscape: distant train whistles blasting through the steady hum of traffic, with the occasional siren. In downtown San Francisco, the hum of the cables that power the cable cars moving under the street. The feel of the air, warm sunshine with a cool breeze, and a hint of fog.

When I come back to you, I am cleaved in two. My current and my younger self walk side by side, a feeling that is not entirely comfortable. I wish I could be the person who takes things more simply and is eager to have a beer with you and relax. But, I am not her. When my shadow self walks alongside I am constantly interrogating—Who was I when I was with you? Who am I now? Have I made enough of the intervening time? Have I lost anything I regret about who I was?

We were together for a long time. I met you a couple of times when I was tiny, and we got involved when I was in my twenties. I spent a lot of my life in your embrace.

Now, I notice the differences—you have a slower gait, a few more wrinkles—you haven’t been keeping yourself up. I remember how much we were to each other. You were the place I met my husband, brought my babies home, watched my family grow and expand, and my parents die. A place where friendships that nurture my soul were discovered and grown.

And I also remember that you were always on your phone during meals, and often burped at the table.

With my latest love I’ve grown accustomed to more mystery and challenge. Sometimes it bothers me that I can’t understand everything, but back with you I do. Total clarity can lead me to distance in another way—on a dark day, to a place of disdain.

At a restaurant, I’m seated near a long table where a celebration of life is happening to honor, let’s call him Mort, who died six months ago. There are about thirty people from a fancy part of San Francisco, who have come off the hill for the lunch.

The first man to speak shares a favorite toast of Mort.

To us.

And People Like Us.

Of which there are damn few.

Everyone laughs in fond memory of Mort, and the many times he gave this toast. And I realize that you just burped again.

But then I come back to the things that I miss: my family and friends, the Pacific Ocean, hummingbirds, abundant cilantro, acidic soil that grows everything, the farmers’ market. And that cool/warm breeze on my skin. I also realize that, as in every love affair, after one falls for someone new, the old lover is never as attractive as they once were.

I’ve moved a lot in my life, and each place holds a discrete part of me in a glass vial, frozen in time. Back and forth—Michigan, Florida, California, Michigan, Florida, California, Florida—all before third grade. A nested doll of little Nancys. Following Florida adolescent Nancy were Stanford Nancy, French Nancy, London Nancy, San Francisco Nancy, and Berkeley Nancy—the latter for twenty years. Now, Italian Nancy. (Do I need to mention yet again that in Italy I’m told my name is exotic and I am tall?) I am fond of all these Nancys in vials, but am not her anymore. And I wonder what Nancy is next.

And to my ex, thank you for the memories. And for making me who I am.