<br><br><center>*The past was but the cemetery of our illusions: 
one simply stubbed one's toes on the gravestones.*
― Émile Zola</center>



<br><br><center>![Agelos_Tzitzifopoulos_women_model_looking_at_viewer_long_hair_blonde_ponytail_face-263760.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmbCEVejD86r3kaUsncJrqwjBExFBuebBGRyvGnjhsTLJv/Agelos_Tzitzifopoulos_women_model_looking_at_viewer_long_hair_blonde_ponytail_face-263760.jpg)
Elaine</center>


<br><b> I was on my way to meet my dead wife—I know that sounds absurd—but I saw a woman from afar who was, pardon the pun, a dead-ringer for Elaine.

 She lived in the basement flat we once rented and drove the same car we once owned.

Coincidence? I don’t think so.

But here’s where my story gets even more implausible, if that’s possible—as I’m crossing the street to approach her door, a car passes driven by my dead friend, Jake.

I waited to get a good look at him—and it was Jake all right—and even after recognizing me, he just casually drove away.

<br><br>I know what you’re thinking and I’d be the first to admit I'm flawed.

 I’ve suffered from depression for the past ten years and well, I’m an alcoholic, although at the moment I have my drinking under control—more or less.

I say more or less because when this thing happened, I had to have a drink to steady my nerves. Face it—wouldn’t you?

But I might never have had these eerie encounters were it not for the fact that I lost my job as a reporter at The Toronto Telegram and ended up in the cheapest rental I could find which just happened to be in a low-rise building just down the street from our old haunt.

<br><br>Okay, you’ll have to excuse the gallows humour because this was such a bad move for me that I tried to end my life by jumping off the low-rise roof.

I was rescued by the cynical landlord who happened to notice and tackle me, preventing me from breaking my neck.

I say he’s a cynic because he joked that I’d probably only break my legs from that height.

Yep, that would have been brutal seeing as I was already dealing with a disability, namely my addiction to drink—so, being in wheelchair permanently would not have enhanced my life.

<br><br> It was hard though living in a place where I could go for a walk and slide right back into the past where I spent the happiest summer of my life, newly married with Elaine and writing some of my best stuff.

Mind you, it wasn’t all wine and roses—there was the annoying older lady who occupied the main floor and always accused us of using all the hot water.

But we turned her into a standing joke shared privately between the two of us, dreaming up ridiculous scenarios where we would torment her.

Elaine was a natural actress who would dramatize the scenes and I’d laugh like hell until I thought I’d puke.

Yeah, good times.

<br><br>And all this nostalgia brings me to a place where I have to admit something painfully true.

If  a benign Fate gave me a second chance  to relive my past, I know in a heartbeat I’d go back and do it all over again.

I even wrote a song about it and a local rock group recorded it and it got some airplay in the Toronto market, anyway.

<center>*Sometimes when I’m feeling blue
And the music keeps pounding
In my brain
I think of the past
All the love that we had,
I’m in love with you, Girl,
Just the same…
And I want to go through it
All over again.*</center>

Well, if that ain’t maudlin, I don’t know what is.


<br><br><center>© 2019, John J Geddes. All rights reserved</center>

<br><br><center>[ Photo]( https://images.app.goo.gl/yMENedH1Y31D4jE96 ) </center>
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