Thursday Afternoon

I confess, as I write the title to this post, it is not really Thursday afternoon. It is Thursday evening. However, as is often the case, as I started thinking about what to write and what I should title it, the Moody Blues song, Tuesday Afternoon, popped into my mind. I loved the Moody Blues when I was in high school. Their music still touches something in my soul.

Why do I think of this song so often?
I'll tell you.
I don't know.
But I sit here at the computer, listening to it play on YouTube in another open window, and my foot is tapping and I can't help but think of 1972.

Graduation from high school. My first apartment, shared with a gal I graduated with. I had only known her for part of the year. Cindy had all of the Moody Blues albums that were out at that time and she listened to them all the time. All the time. I left for work, they were on the stereo. I came home from work, they were on. I came in from a date, they were on.

Cindy and I shared that apartment for a few months. I really don't remember what happened. I got another apartment. She committed suicide. It was not connected. I don't even remember the timeline right now, a few weeks apart, maybe a few months, I don't remember.

I love Moody Blues, but I always think of Cindy sooner or later when I listen to them. That's probably why I don't listen to them very often.

I have no idea why I have a sense of guilt over her suicide. We had very little in common - just a wish to 'be on our own,' away from parents, in our 'own' apartment. I thought later that maybe it's because I spent so much time out with my two (no, make that three - blush) boyfriends, that she felt abandoned. My brain told me that was crazy, my heart said I should have known, I should have understood her pain better. I should have led her to the Lord and He would have fixed her emotional pain and she would still be alive today.

Thirty-six years later I know even more than I did then that that is not true. No one who knew her understood how deep her pain was. How could I, so young, so in love with life, having so much fun, working, fairly popular with the guys, hardly ever home - how could I have understood what she was going through?

So, I did not start out tonight thinking about Cindy. Nor did I start out wanting to write about the Moody Blues. But - there you have it. I'm doing/have done both.

Such is my life. A wander here and there, past and present, thinking future thoughts, never still in my brain.

I still like the Moody Blues, but Nights in White Satin is my very favorite (altho I aways like McArthur's Park better, but it's not a Moody Blues, so off I go again, wandering around in the memories.)

:)