Regrets: We Have but One Life

A poetry account I follow on Twitter posts/hosts a “poetry thread” almost every day. The poet picks a broad topic and shares a poem that relates to or exemplifies the topic/sentiment. Other people share poems that also relate. I usually read the original post and poem and maybe one other one, but seldom dive into the deeper thread. Yesterday’s topic was regret. The accompanying poem was about a person who watched from a dock as a “small shark suffocated & was killed.” The poem ends by saying how terrible it was to “…watch him that way. More terrible to waste my hands just standing.”

In my digital flitting about (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, News, Twitter, Dating Site 1, Dating Site 2, Twitter, Outlook, News, repeat, repeat, repeat), I came across a LinkedIn post that mentioned Dan Pink’s book The Power of Regret. The post said that research shows that regret of inaction builds over time while the regret of action that fails diminishes over time. This is a fancy (research-based) way of saying better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all… or something like that. The image that accompanied this post was a street-level sign – something you might see at a bust stop. The sign reads, “Growth is painful. Change is painful. But there’s nothing as painful as staying stuck somewhere you don’t belong.”

We see this type of “encouragement” frequently paired with the notion of regret. You have but one life, make it count. Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” is a partial lament of knowing we might not come back to the things we’ve saved for later: “Oh, I kept the first for another day! / Yet knowing how way leads on to way, / I doubted if I should ever come back.” And Mary Oliver famously wrote: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do / With your one wild and precious life?”

Yesterday’s algorithms fed me content about regret and throughout the day I gave light consideration to the topic, but not always in the way we usually think about regret. I wasn’t so much reviewing my own actions or inaction through the lens of regret but was thinking about other people who have been in my life and circles and the regrets they may or may not have. This is, admittedly, pure speculation for the satisfaction of my own sense of self-worth – an internal attempt to be liked… an internal attempt to make peace with those whom I’ve hurt or disappointed. We all want to believe that somehow we mattered. Do distant friends wish we had done a better job of staying close? Do past encounters have that burning type of angry regret in which they think they’d have been better off if we had never met? Sympathetic regret of failed connections is one of our deeper regrets, and our fragile ego often hopes that type of regret is a two-way street. There’s a funny Mad Men meme that circulated years ago that cuts to the quick of our desire to be thought about:

Yesterday was also the anniversary of one of my engagements. I write that as though I’ve been engaged a half-dozen time (it’s only been twice). A significant part of this blog (chunks of 2019 and 2020) was in response to that not working out… my long, slow dance with acceptance and refusal, fondness and regret, being stuck and moving through. At about this time three years ago, that particular ex’s boyfriend (or ex boyfriend ) began commenting on my blog. Those comments are hidden now. He said a few unkind things about her and seemed to be projecting their failures as a couple onto our failures as a couple. He was trying to build camaraderie: two guys jilted by the same woman or as he wrote “a sense of solidarity for some other poor sap who went through this before.” Except, having tried and failed, I never felt like a poor sap. I loved honestly and did my best. Much of what he described wasn’t relatable to me. I re-read those comments yesterday too – even in hindsight, they’re not a mirror to my experience with her.

The poet Carl Phillips asked/wrote, “what is the difference between the story we tell of ourselves to others and the song of ourselves that we keep private and sing to nobody else?” I ask myself that question often. Am I authentic and transparent? If love is about knowing and being known, then it seems to be in our interest to close the gap between those two selves… to feast on this constant process of revealing ourselves both to our self and to others, and maybe limit our regrets to when we might have done better as opposed to regretting being vulnerable and getting hurt. From all about love, bell hooks writes, “Fear is the primary force upholding structures of domination. It promotes the desire for separation, the desire not to be known.” In other words, fear (which makes love difficult if not impossible) promotes the desire not to be known – to hide who we are and who we’ve been. So much of what I’ve attempted to do these past few years is to live life a little more fearlessly, to figure out how to weave this “failure” into the story I tell of myself to others. Getting engaged (each time) was a big deal – a major life decision that ranks among the biggest decisions I’ll have ever made. To gloss over it or not mention it seems dishonest. To treat is as something less than the commitment I had intended it to be feels dishonest. There aren’t that many people I take seriously enough to want to spend years, if not decades or a lifetime with.

Many years ago, I had a friend who had been married and divorced. I went out with him and his then serious girlfriend who eventually became his second wife. From my conversation with her (obscured by the noise of a crowded bar), it appeared as though he hadn’t told her that he was married before. I’m sure he eventually did (though he was known for lying, so maybe not), but being married before seems like first date factual material like hair color and the type of wine we enjoy. He’s getting divorced a second time. It’s messy and he publicly vague-blames her (makes vague passive aggressive comments without mentioning her by name) for lots of different affronts and perceived atrocities. He seems to put out there the angry regret vibe… which, to me, feels more like a defense mechanism than anything else.

If the algorithms were feeding me tweets and posts related to regret, my own brain was occasionally reminding me of the significance of the date (engagement anniversary). At times, I began to wonder if this ex of mine has any regrets – and no, not in the good or sweet type of way we have regrets. What does she say if asked about past relationships (our relationship)? It’d be easy for her to mention her marriage and leave out our engagement. It doesn’t feel great to think I could be so easily erased, but for all I know, there could have been others. It could be a life of deletions as opposed to additions. The uncomfortable conclusion I’ve held is that she never meant to take it that far or that perhaps commitment looks different for her than it does for me (little c vs. big C). Two things we probably should have squared away before getting engaged. Zsa Zsa Gabor was married nine times and Elizabeth Taylor was married eight times. And while I can see a type of “freedom” and beauty in loving lots of people, I also know that goes against the grain of my conditioning. I can’t imagine having four or five engagements, or getting move-in serious with a half-dozen people. I know if I’m asked if I regret getting engaged (something I was asked not too long ago), I can say nope, no regerts (and reference the common tattoo joke to lighten the sentiment). Any lingering regrets are associated with not finding a way to make it work or not recognizing it wouldn’t work. But I wonder if (and suspect) this other person explains it away the way one might describe a drunken night in Vegas: “yeah, I don’t know what I was thinking… worst decision ever… not my best moment” And I’m not sure which type of regret or non regret is better or worse and why any of it would even matter… Perhaps it’s just my way of releasing myself from the accountability I’ve tried to shoulder… or maybe these are just the natural thoughts that swirl on a specific date that once had meaning and on a day in which my phone keeps telling me to contemplate regret.

Fortunately, today’s algorithm is sending different vibes. The poetry thread is about simple pleasures, and in a different corner of the poetry twitterverse I encountered this fantastic poem by Sarah Russell. One that explores different desires and different selves with a wonderful level of honesty, sincerity, humor, and maybe a twinge of regret masquerading as longing. I have but one life to live… but man what I’d do if I had three!