Would We? Could We? by Debra H. Goldstein
Would We? Could We? by Debra H. Goldstein
Picture a group of women sitting around a fireplace celebrating a special event in their lives. Good food, friends, sips of wine, and conversation that slips from the present into the past. While most share memories of happy times, children’s antics, and first romances, at some point in the evening the stories begin to be tinged with sadness and frustration.
Patches of the group become silent – lost in individual thoughts of what might have been. It doesn’t seem to matter if the thoughts center on marriage, children, friendship, or career. The questions are the same. “Would we?” “Could we?” “And why didn’t we?”
The answers are consistent, too. Time pressures, immaturity, being pulled in too many directions, trying to please everyone, and ignorance that anything was amiss or could be better are all excuses offered.
Awareness comes slowly. We realize we tried. The thought that none of us may have done it perfectly but we acted in the only way we knew at those times warms us almost as much as the new bottle of wine we open and drink. We raise our glasses in a toast: “We would. We could. We did.”
Excellent post, Debra! It is easy to berate ourselves for what we should have done. So much easier and kinder to simply accept that we did the best under the circumstances. Pretty good is good enough.
And we still do.
You could not have said it better!!!! But if the timing were different, the paths would not have crossed.. Blessing!!!!
Definitely a blessing…….and thank you for your comment.
Thanks for putting into words what we all think at one time or another.
Appreciate that I struck a chord.
What might have been. Yes, I bet most of us have thought that at some time or another, and like you and your friends, we came up with the same excuses as to why we did what we did in the past. When those moments hit me, I think to myself, “You did the best you could with who you were and what you knew back then.” We all need to learn to forgive ourselves. At least we tried.
Hopefully those moments are few and far between as we forgive ourselves. Mary, thanks for stopping by.
You did indeed! And a lot to be proud of.
The irony is we all “did.”