The room was silent and the clock ticked on the wall, signifying the passage of time.
"I mean I know I do a lot. But I do it all differently now. It all changed when I wasn't looking."
"What happens when you start wondering if something that has really happened was a dream or was it real?"
I pursed my lips in deep thought. Missy has posed an existential question and one that some of us must ponder some time in our lives. What happens when a part of your life starts to feel like a dream and you actually begin to wonder if it even really happened?
"I have never changed. I have always stayed the same. And you guys rely on me to stay the same," Mademoiselle said impassively. "I will and shall forever be the rock and the wall."
"But I have," Missy said gently. "I have so much."
I rubbed my eyes tiredly. Missy made me think of something that never really occurred to me before. We all change. But sometimes so much that looking back we surprise ourselves. We surprise ourselves by the choices we have chosen to make. We surprise ourselves by the paths we've chose to take and the things we've picked up and given up along the way. These small changes don't matter so much, don't mean so much when they are made sometimes. But they add up. They all add up and before long you wonder if you have lost everything that made you who you were before this. What happens when your past starts to feel like a dream. And what happens when you actually, genuinely start wondering if it was. Does that mean that we have lost ourselves? Are we different people now?
"I feel like I've lost myself. All the things that used to make me me," Missy exhaled.
"We've all changed. You, me, even Mademoiselle," I finally said evenly. "You've faded, you rallied, you came back. Perhaps not as stubborn-headed as you used to be. We all learned," I directed my statement to Mademoiselle.
"You are our wall. But you're a different wall now. Some refurbishing has been done," I smiled slightly.
Mademoiselle just shrugged lightly.
"It feels strange. To realize that those definitions aren't enough anymore. The way I did things, the things I did. They're all different now. What does that mean?" Missy frowned.
"It means we've all changed. Perhaps we're growing up. And maybe that does mean we're new people now. Maybe old definitions don't define us anymore. Because we're different people now. Not completely different but different enough that what we used to define ourselves may no longer hold true. We're more than those things we thought we were at a younger age," I placated Missy. "It is unnerving to suddenly realize how far we've come and maybe how far away we are now from all we thought made us who we are."
Does that mean that you've left that part of your life behind so completely that it feels so foreign and you start to wonder if it was real? Does that mean that you've abandoned who you used to be and should these two versions of you meet they'd be irreconcilably different? Because one must admit that to leave it so far behind as to wonder if it was a dream is pretty damn drastic.
"Maybe it's ok that we've changed. Maybe it's for the better. We can't stay that way forever. We're better now. I firmly believe that," I assured Missy. "Perhaps you do things differently now but the soul is still there and it is still the same. Just upgraded."
I don't write the same way anymore. Missy has found a new force in her feelings, and Mademoiselle has found a chink in her armour. Where she was a steel rod perhaps she was now a shoot of bamboo. Strong, resistive and resilient, but not inflexible. Sometimes I find my new tone so unusual and I find myself wondering what happened to my old tone. Could I get it back. Was it perhaps better. But we reflect who we are in what we write. And so how can my writing be the same when I am different now. It doesn't have to be better or worse. It could even be better. But it will change to reflect who I am now and what I hold most dear in my deepest, most contemplative thoughts.
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