The woman sat at the edge of the pond, her feet just inches from the edge of the water. As she sat in the glow of the late summer afternoon, Rose adjusted her perch on the tree stump, wondering if she should have brought a chair. “I’m getting too old for this,” she muttered out loud to no one, but didn’t make a move to get up.
She needed to remember.
The weight of a lifetime was on her shoulders, once strong but now bent with time and years of holding a family together. She looked into her reflection at the edge of the pond, and in her mind’s eye saw how she looked years ago – the girl who used to sit here, back straight and eyes bright with the promise of a future. Her mind traveled back to a day long ago …
“Mom, watch this!” Rose looked up to watch her son as he jumped and twirled, his excitement and joy infectious in the moment. “That was epic!” she called out to her son, turning then to her husband, who was busy setting up the video camera to record their children’s antics.
They had spent the previous day at Rose’s grandmother’s funeral, and the loss lingered heavily on her. But what pressed on her even more was a question: “Nick, how did she do it?” She asked quietly, not wanting their kids to hear. “Do what, Rose?” Nick answered, equally quietly. Rose sighed deeply, then blurted out “How did she live an entire lifetime and not seem weighed down at the end? In all the years I knew her, she never seemed to have regrets.”
Rose snapped back into the present moment with a start. She looked around at the pond, her children’s voices fading into memory. They were all grown up now, and had lives of their own. She was proud of them – so proud. But still … she had regrets. There were things she wished she had done differently. As she sat by the pond, each one of them played through her mind. Each memory struck her. As her back bent lower and lower, she thought back to another time, not at the pond …
She remembered walking out of her house for the last time, her daughter crying and her son in silent shock. The door slammed behind them with a finality that underscored her inability to go back to the life she had built. After years of a failed marriage that she tried too hard to hold onto, telling herself it was for the kids, it exploded anyhow. When it did so, it caused collateral damage to everyone. It was messy, and it was painful, and it should have happened years prior. Regret.
Back at the pond, present-day Rose held her hands out toward the setting sun, imagining them holding all the regrets and bad memories from her life. Her hands began to shake, as though unable to hold them all. They were heavy, and she was tired.
Her breath caught, and the sun didn’t feel warm against her skin. For a moment, she closed her eyes, and in the darkness behind them she imagined her grandmother sitting beside her at the water’s edge, her hands resting in her lap.
Empty.
Rose stared at her own trembling hands.
For years, she had wondered how her grandmother had lived with such quiet peace, such presence of mind. As the sun dipped toward the horizon in one spectacular display of color, Rose began to understand. Her grandmother hadn’t been free of regrets. She had simply learned to put them down.
She slowly lowered her hands to her lap, and as she gazed across the water, she heard her grandmother’s voice in her heart: “Let it go, Rose,” she seemed to be saying. “No life is lived without regret. No childhood happens without some sadness. But that’s not all there is.” Rose was jolted back to the present by a buzzing in her pocket. Her phone was ringing. She quickly glanced down to see that it was her daughter. She stood up straight, smiled at the pond, and greeted her daughter warmly.
