Friday Musings: Phoebe Kat
For as far back as I can remember, I have always been a person who has watched the clock and flipped the calendar pages. Even as a young child, I looked forward to whatever was next with as much anticipation as my little heart could muster. Birthdays, Christmases, certain family parties and cookouts. My cousin Nancy’s wedding at age 11 when I was a junior bridesmaid and danced all night with the boy I thought I’d marry, high school graduation and the parties that followed, my own wedding at age 21. When these big moments in life arrived, I felt as though they had an aura about them, existing within a bubble that held them both suspended in time and protected from the outside world. I soon learned that within this insularity there was also a deceptive fragility. Every amazing and wonderful life event was always followed by a certain feeling that I could only describe as sadness. I felt so guilty even acknowledging it. I’d just had this intensely happy experience that was evolving into an unforgettable memory, and here I was with a major case of weepiness. Just the slightest google search will point us towards something called opponent process theory which takes the position that we’re most comfortable in a Goldilocks state of emotional homeostasis. More simply put, once we feel one intense emotion, its opposite is certain to follow until we level out again. Sure, I’ll buy that, but isn’t it true that the brightest colors of the aura were always meant to fade, the walls of the bubble to give way, and reality to set back in? The fullness we feel in our hearts simply cannot last forever. We know this. Our big event has ended, and something makes us wish that we could find a way to live it all over again.
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