Memories and Future. Two brilliant concepts. Who came up with them? Two constant companions separated by you at every moment in time. Isn’t that amazing? One doesn’t exist without the other and neither exists without you. One always behind you and the other always ahead of you. One ever so familiar and the other a complete stranger.
If life is a landscape covered with freshly fallen snow, future is the vast, pristine blanket of snow ahead of you like a blank canvas. You don’t know which way you will go or where it will lead you but with every step into the future you leave a footstep of memory behind. When you look back, you know where you started but looking ahead it is still that blankness, the unknown. You don’t know what the future holds. With every step there is fear, but there is also hope.
What if, in a parallel universe, they were switched? Some where out there you are standing in the middle of one endless snow clad field. You look ahead and you see where you are going but when you look back you don’t know where you are coming from. Doesn’t sound too bad right? After all who wants to live in the past any way. Plus, if you know the future there is no fear of the unknown. Sounds like a great deal, right? Right?
Wrong! You couldn’t be more wrong. How would you know any way? But I will try and explain. Imagine remembering that someone you love died a slow and painful death in front your eyes and how helpless you were in the months leading up to that day. Now imagine them being alive and in front of you. Are you delighted that they are still alive or is their presence a constant reminder of the painful future, one that is inevitable and that you will never be able to alter, till the day it arrives?
Do you remember falling in love? That feeling of a warm liquid pouring out of your heart and seeping through your entire body down to the smallest toe? Now imagine meeting the love of your life and knowing that you have already fallen in love with them and perhaps even out of it. If you already know you love them in future, there is no falling in love. You know what your first date was like and, of course, your first fight. Probably the last too. All this at the moment you first lay your eyes upon them.
That specialness of the first time you kiss someone? Every first kiss is like no other kiss. Imagine meeting someone for the first time but you already know how their lips will made you tingle all over. You have already lived the moment. You will never get to feel it for the first time.
Imagine knowing what your wedding day was like. Knowing what the happiest moments of your life felt like before they even arrive. Imagine knowing everything that you failed at in life but being unable to stop yourself from failing at them. Everyday you watch yourself inching towards a failure. Just like watching a train wreck happen in slow motion. Except this train is your life.
Imagine knowing all the regrets you had when you died. But still going through life collecting them as mementos to take to your grave.
Having memories of the future is not a gift. How do I know? Because I live with it! And not one moment goes by when I don’t wish to embrace the end that refuses to come early because I know exactly how far it is.
This curse has a name. Avenoir.