I just came back from a walk around my yard, checking to see if there might be any surprises for me to address that have occurred over the winter season—a carcass, a fallen tree—whatever. At five acres, I'm not completely alone, but I'm not standing outside my neighbor's living room either. Living here is far removed from those convenient days of suburbia, Midtown, and East Memphis. Don't mistake my desire for hi-speed Internet access and Chinese / pizza delivery to be a longing: I don't mind running across the occasional snake or aardvark in the yard compared to the roaming horde of Memphis streets—a bit of a The Walking Dead vibe, I know. Cities are unnatural places, but I appreciate them for that aesthetic, not unlike my interest in science fiction and the current trend of dystopian cinematography. I can only watch so much rom-com before it is becomes that much maligned last doughnut—you know the one.

I forget how much I enjoyed—no, need to float through nature. As an introvert, it's a great place to recharge. I do a lot of talking to myself there—well, I do a lot of talking to myself everywhere, but alone in nature is where I can make a conversation of it.

The realization came unto me that it is time to part and share a goodbye embrace with my old friend of the Past. Though it is no longer what it once was, the Past has an amiable feel of old leather; this should not be. What's the point—am I forever to be reminded of the death throes of potential or living in Arizona or Alaska or all that was once the awesome promise of a rocket ride in those days through and past the Czech Republic and grad studies? I completely skipped my MA graduation because I thought it was small potatoes compared to what was on the horizon. I can't keep living back there. I'm reminded of Sisko in DS9 attempting to explain linear time to the wormhole aliens, when all the while "living" in his own specific moment in time, in essence like the Duran Duran lyric, "lonely in (his) nightmare."

There are moments when I find the quiet getaway of the Past to develop a keener vision of spiritual truth and direction on an intuitive level that I did not casually possess. But, I fail to find it today...and if I'm honest with myself, it is a portal of embers to the vestibule of a once raging blaze.

Somewhere along the way, I've malformed my relationship with the Past into this hideous Rocky figure who can take an inordinate amount of liver shots until we collapse together onto the canvas. It is no longer about a path of humility while pursuing greater truths, but just...a silly facade of American consumerism. "Does this make me feel good right now?" Me, me, me...again with the ex-Agent Smith.

So, somehow, someway, I release the Past into the great deep.

The INTJ was never built for the past, but forged in steely-eyed resolve in the marrow of the morrow.