Twenty Years From Now

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Yesterday I found an old vinyl record, a ‘single’. It was a Kenny Rogers song named ‘Twenty Years From Now’ that came out in 1987. My boyfriend at the time had written a little note on the cover. He also noted on the label of the disc the year 2007.

I tried to play the record, but the vinyl was scratched beyond repair. And as I sat there, reading the note, looking at the hearts drawn on the label ~ slowly the memories came back of that day in July of 1987 when I was given the record. At the time it meant a promise. It was meant to tell me that twenty years from that day, we’d sit somewhere ~ maybe at some cafe downtown, enjoying the sun ~ sharing the memories of what live had been like twenty years ago... What we had been doing at the time. And reminisce about all the changes that would have happened since then...

As it turned out, that relationship lasted about two more years before I had had enough.

Nevertheless, looking at this record I start to look back at those Summer days in 1987. Him and I had been co-workers before I moved on to another job. Shortly after that he changed jobs too... And what started as a friendship between two people with common interests ~ mostly in outdoor type events ~ fairly soon began to wear thin on me; until shortly after my birthday I returned his keys and all of his stuff to his apartment and firmly shut the door behind me.

We both moved on.

I had seen him in town a couple of times over the years. I even met his new girlfriend ~ a nice lady who shared his love for motor cycles.
I totally forgot about the record and the promise to look back together on those twenty years...
Come the ‘magical year’ of 2007 he had passed on.

Yet, I can’t help myself thinking “What if...”
What if we would have stayed together? What would my life have looked like in 2007?

Would I still have been touring on my motorbike?
Would I have ever taken that trip to France to go ‘para-ascending’ ~ using a parachute to actually fly on the air currents in the mountains ~ that I really wanted to take and never did?
Would I have traveled as much as I have since?

Probably not ~ on all three counts.

But right as I put the damaged record back into its sleeve, one curious thing comes to mind...
In 2007 a mutual friend of way back when called me out of the blue, asking me how we were doing and if we felt coming along on a trip to France...
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