My Constant

This entry has been kicking around my head for about 2-3 weeks now, so I figure I'd better get it down before it knocks something loose in there.

On LOST, there was an episode about one of the characters time traveling between the present and 8 years ago. A physicist told him that he had to have a 'constant', someone or something that is important to him then and now, for his consciousness not to, essentially, fry and kill him. (If you've seen the episode, this needs no explaining. If you have not seen it, no amount of explanation would suffice.) Anyway, I started thinking my life, as it was, 8 years old at around this time...

I was just about to finish 1st year at McMaster and my first year at 150 Sqn. Things were going well, and I was going to have to choose soon between learning how to fly that summer, or going back to Cold Lake. I have often regretted choosing the former, but perhaps nothing exceptional would have been different had I gone with the latter instead. I was beginning to realize that I probably couldn't be a doctor with a D in Biology and Chemistry. I knew that I was absurdly good at Psychology and Math though. I was going to visit my dad in Shanghai for a month after exams, and when I get back, I will be Chief of my squadron, beating the 4 other WO2's who grew up there. In general, I was quite happy with life, having finally escaped from home, and able to assert a measure of independence, living at residence, yet not too far from home. And I was about to throw away the most important relationship of my life.

If I could talk to that 18 year old now, I would say, "Don't do it!! You will never experience that degree of contentment again in your life (at least not for the next 8 years)", but that bratty, self-assured kid would tell me of her (self-manufactured) angst, and how it was the right thing to do. She would make herself go on Power because she believed that it was necessary to have the wings to command respect to lead a bunch of kids who she knew next to nothing about. She would have romantic and idealistic notions of leadership. She could write, and she could dream. And if I had told her that she will be graduating law school in 8 years, she'd probably have frown slightly, wondered why it would take so long, and with a quick smile, go on with her day, secured in the knowledge that though her family is crazy, she looked forward to what he would say when she told of him this conversation later.

Some things we don't grow out of, despite changing majors and schools, ideals and despair, promotions and accidents, triumphs and heartbreaks, births and deaths. The music carries us though, and what's important then remains today.