Forgetting can be a beautiful thing. I mean, imagine if you actually remembered everything you ever learned, did, or ate, and everyone you ever shook hands with, passed on the street, or went to high school with. Your brain would start spilling out of your head because it would be packed with completely useless information like how to do calculus (assuming sitting in class everyday meant you ever knew how to do it) and the names of every person you sat in calculus class with everyday for a year. Now most people would say that it's perfectly acceptable to forget everything you ever learned in calculus class (unless you're a math major or something, but...ew). However, I think that we often think it's a bad thing to forget people; to let even the most insignificant human relationships slip away. I, on the other hand, think it can be wonderful.
If you are currently thinking to yourself, "self, Emily is an antisocial Scrooge", just hold your horses (shout out to Sue) for a minute. I don't just up and forget about people like it's a hobby. In fact, this blog post is inspired by an evening I recently spent with two of my closest friends from high school; friends I intend to keep for the rest of my life, if they'll have me. Here's the story:
A few days ago on December 17th it was the anniversary of the Wright brothers' first flight and, coincidently (or not coincidently at all), my friend Kris's 21st birthday! Right there you have two excellent reasons to celebrate, so celebrate we did. On Saturday night my friend Charlotte and I (along with Orville and Wilbur) took Kris out for a drink at the Nitty Gritty. We sat down at a table, ordered our beverages (don't worry, Charlotte got a soda), and proceeded to play "People We Have Completely Forgotten About From High School" for about two hours. This is a game in which one person mentions the name of someone from our high school class that he or she thinks the other two will have completely forgotten about, then we proceed to laugh because we have indeed forgotten about this person. As I said, this went on for a long time until we started to feel uncomfortable because some of those very people we had just mentioned walked into the bar. I'm not making this up. We left.
Here's my point: some relationships matter, and others don't. Some relationships matter for a while and then cease to matter, and others don't matter at all for sometime and then suddenly become invaluable. So it's okay to let go of the ones that don't matter; it's okay to forget about people. If you do, then it gives you more time to spend making sure that you don't lose the relationships that ARE important. I mean, if you spend four years sitting across from someone in class, and a few years later you literally can't remember his or her last name, chances are that person is not meant to play an starring role in your life. He or she may be a wonderful person, and maybe even play the lead role in someone else's life, but that doesn't mean you have to exchange Christmas cards. It's interesting, though. The fact that you can spend years in close proximity to one person and feel little or no connection, and then you can become instantly close with someone else just because your names are pulled out of a hat consecutively (shout out to Shane). They're the keepers though, the pulled-out-of-a-hat people. They're the ones who will be there for you when your favorite horse dies, and the ones who will always hold open the Batmobile door for you.
I think we sometimes hold on to fickle relationships because we're afraid that all of our relationships from the past will disappear if we let ourselves move on with our lives, grow up, or change. However, it comes down to trust. Trust that the truly important relationships from the past will continue into the future, and trust that the future will introduce you to relationships deeper than you could ever imagine. Some people may fall out of your life, but others will enter your life; and some will be there the whole time, sitting next to you at a bar laughing when you can't remember the names, or picture the faces of half of your high school class.
Also. Merry Christmas! I hope you all get to spend this joyful time of year with all of those people who matter most to you.
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