Is It Live or Is It Memorex

 I'm sure that most reading this won't know what the subject line of the post means.  There was an ad a long time ago that asked, "Is it live or is it Memorex."  Memorex was a particularly popular brand of VHS and cassette tapes, and everyone knew of them, then... a sign of how things change.  They were advertising how real sounding something was.. it was almost like the real thing... almost.  But, it was a copy.  It wasn't live... it wasn't real.  It was a recording, which can have flaws.

Our memories are like that.  Today, I was reflecting on how a lot of my past relationships failed from an APPEARANCE or an ASSUMPTION of what I believed to be true, even if it wasn't in fact actually true.  I mourned over "losing" what had... in fact.. never existed.  If I looked for times that my ex's wrote romantic notes to me, I would have to look in vain.  If I tried to find the moments in my memory that had them coming up behind me to put their arms around me or say that they loved me, without my saying it first... I would be inventing some memories.  The reality is that what I mourned never really existed, and maybe THAT is what I was truly mourning.  They were just being the same person that I always had in front of me, even if I assumed something else to satisfy the imbalance of emotions shown.

It is so funny how we often imprison OURSELVES over things.  It is like Tate McRae's song, "Tear Myself Apart," where she talks about how we tend to criticize ourselves after something fails, even if it had nothing to do with us.  And, in the new book I am reading... Making Money by Terry Pratchett, I read, "..you get him to build his own rack, and let him turn the screws all by himself."  Very often, we are the only one judging ourselves for non existent wrongs, while the other person hasn't given a second thought to us.  Some say, "It is that it is," but we should also make sure "It was that it was," as well.

So, I do think that it is important for us, as we are making our foundation to rise from failures to fully understand what WAS failures and what was just incorrect matching and missteps and, after gaining our footing, rise in confidence of a future when we are in the right place and state of mind in the right time and connection of factors to make a successful opportunity appear in front of us.