No Regrets?

This past summer, I read a book called No Regrets. A somewhat autobiographical semi-historical narrative, unexpectedly interrupted at times with poetry-related bits, it wasn’t exactly my cuppa.

Perhaps I’m not used to such a rambling, mish-mash of prose, and poetry that didn’t always appear to be poetry.

Personally, I felt it could have used editing, particularly for grammar, punctuation errors, and run-on sentences that interrupted the flow. I’ll leave the poetry to those more gifted in that art form.

But the theme of the book started me wondering: Can you live a life with no regrets?

I suppose, if you have a Pollyanna outlook, or you’re lucky enough not to commit any egregious mistakes along the way, it’s possible.

But I’m not that person.

Yes, there are aspects of my life for which I’m satisfied or even duly proud.

But I do have regrets.

True, mistakes are meant to be a learning experience. But when the same situation occurs over and over, what is the lesson to be learned?

For example, you meet someone who seems pretty nice, but after dating for a while – or sometimes only once – you discover what a jerk the person really is. It wasn’t something you could tell without a few dates. Sometimes the relationship might be very hurtful.

Okay, one such relationship would be a lesson to be more careful and discerning about people. Probably shouldn’t have dated that one.

But when it happens multiple times, you have to wonder why life is beating you up this way. How are you supposed to know nice-seeming people are really creeps when they give no sign?

This is particularly distressing when you meet nice people in-between, who actually are nice people, but simply aren’t for you.

I’ve often heard others say, “If I could live my life over…” This is usually followed by, “knowing what I know now.”

But no.

Realistically, some of the things I know now were not knowable when I was a child.

I wish I could re-do my entire school life, from first through 12^th grades. Not knowing what I know now, but being encouraged to work harder and do better. Since my grades were usually fine, I didn’t get much encouragement. Besides, I was just a girl.

It would have been nice to have been given reasons to do well, a bigger picture – like winning the medal in a particular subject, or preparing the way for an academic scholarship later.

Expecting me to do my best just because I should, when I didn’t see it getting me anywhere, didn’t work.

A word of encouragement, a smile, an expression of my parents being pleased when I did well would have gone a long way. Never mind the present-day habit of paying children for good grades.

Instead, when I earned a B, I was asked why it wasn’t an A. Or when the next grade was an A, I was asked, “Why didn’t you do that last time?”

I’ve been told this negative reinforcement is a particularly Irish attitude. I don’t know if there’s a rule among people of Irish heritage that it is wrong to ever praise a child for good work, but that was my parents’ philosophy.

While it’s true that my ADD and mild dyslexia got in the way of some things, “knowing what I know now” probably would have kept me from developing my own unique compensations. I might never have learned to think outside the box.

I suppose it would have been nice to have extra time to complete standardized tests. But most of the time, I didn’t need it. I did better on those tests than the ones my teachers dreamed up.

Social life was always more difficult for me than academics.

If I had it to do over, I would wish my mother hadn’t been so focused on instilling empathy – “How would you feel if someone said that to you?” (ignoring that someone had) – and had, instead, instilled a sense of justice and standing up for myself, something I’ve never been good at doing.

I wish someone had clued me in on what people didn’t like about me so I could fix it, instead of still having no clue how to make friends. It would have saved me from hanging around people I didn’t particularly like simply because they let me.

I wish I’d worked harder in school and gone to a better university. Maybe then I wouldn’t have spent 30+ years in a profession I didn’t like and wasn’t suited for.

I wish I were kinder. I try, but it gets difficult when people are pushing my buttons.

I wish I knew how to be more loving – or at least how to be more comfortable expressing it, other than on paper.

I wish my feelings didn’t get hurt as easily as they do.

I wish I had more patience. Some people think I’m very patient; I know better.

I wish I didn’t talk so much. I know people don’t want to hear what I have to say most of the time. Sometimes it feels like an alien has taken over and controls my mouth.

I wish I didn’t have so much anger inside me. People easily say, “Just let it go,” but can never offer a way to do that.

No regrets? I don’t think regrets are a bad thing. They show you where you need improvement.

Life isn’t about perfection. It’s about becoming your best possible self.

If you regret nothing, you never see the potential for improvement.

Yes, I wish I hadn’t had certain experiences and relationships or made certain decisions. Would that have made me a different person? Possibly. But I’m not convinced that would be a bad thing.

The Last Day of a Praying Mantis

When I started my blogsite, I promised the occasional short story. Here, for your perusal, is one of them.  I give you "The Last Day of a Praying Mantis."

While he waited for the shop to open, Martin sat on the curb and drank a cup of tea. Something on the sidewalk caught his attention: a praying mantis. He’d never seen one before. The light green bug, its front-most legs together, looking like praying hands, stood balancing itself against the ground breezes. It appeared ready to fly off, yet it waited, as if not sure how to proceed.

            Its movements were so small as to be nearly imperceptible. Still, it managed to come closer to a thick black tar line across the sidewalk. Martin watched the bug so intently he didn’t see the bicyclist coming until the wheel was nearly level with the bug. Before Martin could utter a sound, the front wheel rolled over the bug, pinning its head to the cement.

            Martin watched its wings flutter as if in pain, with stuttering attempts to flutter that seemed a dance of death. Martin could imagine the pain screaming through the tiny bug, and wondered how long it would be in these death throes. He watched, hoping the little bug wouldn’t suffer much. It moved in a circle around that pinpoint that was now its head stuck to the ground.

            But death did not come. As Martin watched, the determined bug managed to get his head unstuck from the cement, and gradually regained an upright posture. It stretched itself like a rubber cartoon character, and then stood unsteadily, taking tentative sideways steps to cross over the tar strip that the breeze and its efforts to stand had moved it toward.

            The shop finally opened, and Martin stood. As he did so, a woman approached the shop, and without noticing it, crushed the praying mantis as she passed. Martin wanted to scream. He had debated about killing the bug after the bicycle had run it down, not knowing whether to put the insect out of its misery or wait to see if it lived. He’d had little hope that the bug would live, but a sense of relief and triumph had suffused the young man when the bug finally regained itself. To see its life snuffed out so suddenly after all of its efforts to live made him angry at the carelessness of everyday acts.

 He wondered how many creatures he’d consigned to the grave by just such an ordinary act. He didn’t feel much pity for ants or mosquitoes, but to watch something larger make such a struggle made him stop to think. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the man on the bicycle had simply killed the praying mantis outright. The valiant struggle became meaningless in light of the fact that it had only prolonged the bug’s life for a few painful moments of suffering.

Life, Zen, whatever it might be taught no lessons but cruelty, he thought. Tread softly through life, he thought. Perhaps that could be his mantra for today, at least. He stood, and went into the shop for a haircut.