Goodbye Mr. Past, I'm going to make Lemonade.

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The past always comes knocking...





Just when life hands me lemons and I am about to make lemonade, the buzzer goes and Mr. Past is standing pathetically outside my door begging for something.  Could be redemption, but more likely forgiveness,  and an unowed apology (I have nothing to be sorry for).  He wails and shouts, screams and curses, tone aggressive, voice hoarse with emotion, mock-pleading, when in reality he is emotionally blackmailing me, with his chosen phrases, and timbre of voice.  I listen, rolling my eyes, shielding the cat from the menacing atmosphere behind the door, wondering what will make Mr. Past go back to whence he came - pre-me, pre-drama, pre-aggression.  It is evident he does not want this for himself, because he has come around before.  No lessons have been learned here. When the clock tolls ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five minutes I profusely and silently pray the knocks become fainter then disappear altogether - because it seems too demanding to just wish it would go away right?  I am weak.  Not just from exhaustion at playing it cool, but from mentally over-thinking conversations I am not able to have with him, and supposed reasons I will most likely never understand.  I must remember it is this same exhaustion I feel when talking to him anyway, so his presence is it not required, however ironic is it, that he's standing at my door. Eventually the shouting fades and the positivity flows back into the air like the aftermath of a dementor attack.  I am grateful.  This cycle can only be broken when I  realise I cannot make excuses for him.  Mr. Past shows his true colours on his own.  His spiels of random reasoning, and mixed up conclusions always show face, after he can no longer keep up the charade of saneness.  Take it all with a pinch of salt, I have learned.  Block it out, and focus on tiny particles of dust floating through the air in the room between you.   You should understand that the past comes to you, to reclaim you.  To grasp you, and carry you back to its lair where it will incorporate your presence in re-runs of situations already experienced.  The aim: to attempt to change history by acting just how it should have first time round.  Not a second chance its after, but the power to elevate themselves as proof it did the 'right thing'.  What past does not take into account, is your new attitude towards it, based on your first time experiences.  Quite rightly so.   As I stare at my lemons, and sugar on the kitchen work surface, I consider my position and the path laid in front of me.  There is only one; no choices to make.  I slice into my first lemon.  The pale yellow juice oozes over the worktop, and brings me back to life.  Lemons and lemonade.  Lemons and lemonade.  I am only in control of the present, no matter how many times Mr. Past comes knocking.  The door is already closed.  Leave it that way.  The most important thing to remember is putting your knife down when you hear that knock, wont make the lemonade. No one ever got anywhere in life, by not making lemonade.




Much Love, EL x