Posted December 22nd, 2003 by Michelle

In the aforementioned mediocre yet partly funny Jack Nicholson/Diane Keaton movie, our male hero revisits every woman of his past to 1) say he’s sorry and to 2) find out what went wrong. Naturally this only happens after he’s “fallen in love” for the “first time in his life”. The requisite doors were slammed in his face by fatless vixens, but of course the girl carrying a cello stopped to talk to him. As I watched this most predictable parade, and in the days since, I wondered how many of us have actually done that. How many of us have had the wherewithal, the time, the inclination, and the courage, to go back and talk to our lost loves?

There are many to whom I’d like to say I’m sorry. One would be Joe Maurelli, my first real boyfriend. We met and fell in love, in the beginning of eighth grade, but by Christmas I had dumped him for a seventeen-year-old with a car. To date, he’s the best guy I’ve ever been with, the kindest and sweetest, and our breakup began my pattern of doom. Then, skipping the small stuff, there was Cliff. Cliff and I were probably equal jerks to each other, and I’d love to have a beer with him now. Then Brad, and that whole crowd, and while I’m nostalgic for that year of my life I know that most of my emotional scaring and damage happened there in Basking Ridge, New Jersey.

Skipping around again, I’d have to also apologize to Jonathan. His parents were blue-blood Chinese, and violently disapproved of our union. They went as far as pulling him out of college and taking him around the world to get him away from me. It worked, all to easily. I don’t think that Jon really knew what love was- he learned too much from movies- and so I usually thought he was completely full of it, particularly when he was trying to be sincere. Ah, Jonathan. I hope you are somewhere, happily married, with about ten beautiful little babies running at your feet.

Who next, that counts? Radames, you sweet man, I’ll obviously never forget you, nor how entirely incompatible we were. Rob? You probably read this blog every now and then. Again, we were both jerks, but there is so much good stuff to remember, too. Matt? Ugh. Okay, so, yeah, I completely fell in love with someone else while we were dating, but you didn’t even really like me until I did. I mean this gently, but fair is fair.

And then I got it right. I left Matt for another man, and this one I loved. I loved him through his rages, his ugliness, his brilliance, his pain. I wore him on my sleeve. And he was the absolute worst, of all of them. Wayne, you are not savvy enough to find this blog, and have long ago put me from your mind, but I would never apologize to you. You are the perfect embodiment of what is wrong between men and women, between friends, lovers, between what should and shouldn’t happen. No, I wouldn’t apologize to you, because for once the only thing I did wrong was stay. What I would do is thank you, oh, god, thank you for leaving me because I was far too sick to leave you.

But this short list leaves out so much, so very many near misses and wishes and should-have-beens and smart choices and utterly stupid actions. Love was so complicated in my past. It seems so simple now.

There are one or two still out there that I’d like to sit with. I’d like to take their face in my hands and say, “I’m sorry. I was lost. I couldn’t help it. I cared so deeply and I couldn’t control it, but now, I’m sorry. Can we just start over? Can we just grab a beer and be friends and take it from there? Because there was a time when we both thought the other was worth our precious time, so let’s just start there and make good of what went bad. What do you say?”

I wonder, searching through my life, if there is anyone out there who wishes they could say these words to me. All I can do is keep hoping that I will choose to do better next time. That, now, is the courage I hope to keep.