Once Upon a Remote Control

"There's something I want to say, so I'll be brave. You were what I wanted, I gave what I gave. I'm not sorry I met you, I'm not sorry it's over, I'm not sorry there's nothing to save..." -Excerpt from the song, "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" by Stars

The dream came exactly when I needed it. Born of a conversation about Life Rewind and Life Fast Forward buttons and the movie "Click" starring Adam Sandler. I said that sometimes I know exactly what I'd do if given yesterday's second chance with today's hindsight, and sometimes I feel like even if given the chance, I'd just freeze in my tracks, too afraid to try anything different.

Then I slept.

When I awoke in a dream, I found that my days were moving in reverse. It was an endless dream, always in motion. I watched my children grow younger. I saw my ex-husband's return. I saw myself re-impregnated and moving back to our old home. I watched as everything went backward, and my children disappeared from existence, my mother returned to my side, the years fell from my face, the pounds melted away and my body returned to a day when I still had a shot in hell at being a dancer. I slept in my childhood home, hugged and kissed my parents goodbye and hello. I wrote term papers. Friends came back to life. I danced in the night clubs and worked my day job at Busch Gardens. I was in a mixed state of panic and ecstasy when I finally found myself at a familiar door at a now-defunct apartment complex near my college's campus. I was suddenly frozen at that door. I knew what day it was. I knew I would walk in, and in the kitchen to my right would be my 19-year-old ex-husband, sitting alone, shy and calm. Ahead of me would be the rest of the party, college guys and scantily-clad college girls, drinking, laughing and dancing. My old friend appeared behind me and pushed me forward. Things had stopped moving backward. The door opened. I turned my head and looked at him. This is the part where I always used to tell myself I should've kept walking and not initiated a conversation. But he smiled and I smiled back, and I walked over as if pulled by a force field, and it occurred to me that I needed him to happen to me, and he needed me to happen to him.

It was all supposed to happen.

Regardless of what choices would eventually drive us back apart, we were supposed to connect at that party, he was supposed to stand by me through the loss of my mom, we were supposed to bring two beautiful lives into the world, and our separation was supposed to mean something to BOTH of us. We were soulmates that were not meant to stay together. We were best friends that were too toxic to each other to see it through. I had to be alone, be stronger, find out who I was. He had things to learn, too. And it is all okay.

Our dream conversation was different than the real conversation that took place at that party some 12 years ago. It was as if he had just watched his life in rewind, too, and had made peace with it all. We could go forward again and be okay. "Love you," he said. "Love you, too," I said. He took my hand in a gesture of friendship, and I woke up, with my 2-year-old son's hand in its place. I was relieved to have come back to reality so quickly, no matter how challenging that reality has so recently become. I was relieved mostly that I did not have to relive the 12 years that had built me and brought me to a quiet house on a humid Sunday morning.

I don't want a second chance at yesterday. I want a first chance at today.

We are forever linked, and that's okay. It's finally okay.