"Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est." Sir Francis Bacon
I made a fundamental mistake by going back and reading entires from my old web journal today. I realized that I really need to go through and systematically tear that whole site down. It has not aged well, and as such it is a bit of a personal embarrassment. If I ever needed proof that I have become a better writer in the last five years, that is a perfect example.
The grander story of this writeup exists at the point where I stumbled across an old name in one of my entries. I have written here about some episodes in my life with this person, none of which particularly need to be reheated at the moment. Suffice to say that in a moment of weakness, I googled this name. I'm sure that I'm not the only person that has gone to google to look up people from their past, so I will only feel slightly ashamed that I have fallen into this trap.
Given what I had assumed would be a drawn out process, I was surprised to see her pop right up on the first page of results. Email address, street address, phone number. All of them were right there within five seconds.
Perhaps this is a terrible thing to say, but I really thought she would have fallen off the edge of the earth by now. Her life has always been one of chaos and indeterminate motivations, some of her own doing and some through no fault of her own. I have a lot of pity for her, but at the same time there are so many unresolved issues that I wouldn't even know where to begin. Yet the availability to send her an email is dangled right there in front of my face. I shouldn't, and I won't, sent her an email or a letter or give her a ring. Perhaps I am writing this to convince myself to an extent, but I my motivation behind this decision is three fold:
1) I am actively trying to limit the amount of turmoil in my life. Sending her an email is more than likely the opposite fucking cardinal direction from this. Things here are settled and good, and nothing too terribly out of the ordinary happens. I've already run that gambit; I don't need a historical tour.
2) I'm not saying she's fragile, but if she is anything like she was, dropping her a line is bound to cause more harm than good. I try not to cause harm, especially in cases such as these. She does not possess critical information, or my belongings, nor is she a family relation. I don't see where I have a right to fuck with her status-quo?
3) Perhaps the truest of the three, the fact that there has been no communication in five years is a sign that there shouldn't be any communication. I say this because I'm not exactly a hard person to find. I have (and had) a unique last name, and I'm not exactly tucked around any corners on the internet. If she wanted to talk to me, we would be talking.
I hate it when shit like this pops back up into my life, especially when I cause this to come back up. It makes me feel crazy, and I've been working very hard to keep my mental balance. This year has been harder than most in that respect, for some reason. Why I even did something stupid like that is beyond my comprehension.
So I put down the Archos, and went back to reading my book. Like I should have been doing in the first place.