The Future Perfect

The future perfect me doesn't cry into her pillow. She has a fulfilling career, is a wonderful mother and has a man on the side. A friend with accessories as her boy described it. She certainly doesn't have a gay ex husband living in the basement. In fact, come to think of it, she is no longer the owner of a house with a basement. Out he had to go, like dirty bathwater. Swoosh! There he was gone. No, the future perfect me lives in a beautifully restored old four bedroom house paid for by her considerable income as a best selling author of contemporary literary fiction and poetry. Best not to forget the poetry. Small markets. Huge meaning.
There are no dead brothers here either. No visions of hanging or of her father's face as he raised his little hand to wave goodbye to his cold dead son. No grief club, or counselling, no question marks over mental health. As if it was a separate sinister disease in itself that could be only whispered about.
Here, in the future perfect me there is only wisdom and contentment. She deals with life with ease as the Indian dude with the smooth voice is wont to say. She breathes in joy and breathes out negativity. She does not worry that her age and baggage makes her unlovable and ugly. You old baggage. Perhaps that's where the word came from? She is not in the least concerned that she is odd and will never find a way to manage to incessant stream of thinking thinking, always thinking in her head. "Here you may nurse it a bit if you like the duchess said to Alice flinging the baby at her as she spoke." You see what I have to put up with? That's Granny O'D that is. And she was peculiar at the best of times.
Uh oh the current me is trying to wrestle the vision of future perfect me from my grasp. For fecks sake! No respite. No peace. Did you think of me that night as you stepped out into the dark and here am I bereft and howling wanting one more look, one song. No lullaby. You've gone. No idea if you thought of me that night. There he is again, the brother.
The future perfect me knows better how to handle him. How to grieve him properly. How to sit up straight, drink water, exercise, be sad but not too sad we wouldn't want everyone thinking you were a madzer now would we. Hmmmm. who's talking to whom I wonder? Lets focus now on the task at hand. What else does Miss. Future Perfect do? She plays piano? Oh how simply marvellous. Tunes people know and beautiful moving songs about love, loss and happy endings? Nothing about the coming out types then? No songs about souls mates, romantic weddings, difficult marriages and big bombshells? No? Shame. Still we are in the future perfect now and like a Little Miss in a Mr Man book, you are Miss Future Perfect. Pssst ! Are you going to mention the drink problem? Is there a drink problem looming? I mean, if its in the genes! Arms folded, tight mouthed sucking lemons woman. Where did she come from? The future perfect me sips champagne, enjoys fine wines and only occasionally becomes mildly intoxicated. She would never try to drink her feelings away, slug vodka neat from a bottle or try to move through the days like an out of body experience. It walks, it talks but is it really Mammy? Oh dear. Will there be love affairs? Oh yes and not just the friend with accessories. There will be a person who will love the future perfect me just as she is. And they will read and cook and make love and go for walks and live ordinary lives, content that they found each other just waiting to be loved. There will be no seedy Plenty of F***wits online nor conmen waiting to steal her childlike joy. There will be no sexual encounters where he nudged himself ceaselessly until he had grasped and muddied the very centre of her.
She will end with a poem and hope for the best and that soon, oh yes soon, my darling, the future perfect me is coming and will know how to deal with mahoosive life events in an appropriate, timely and preferably linear fashion. It was going to be a poem wasn't it? And now it's not. Ah well sure what's for ya wont go by ya as they say. Such a strange mix of accents and cultures. Wherever did that come from? She shakes her head and laughs her tinkly laugh, just a hint of loss and regret behind the eyes.

The future perfect me
has no memory of mine
how I wish I could have
loved her, go back in time.

and say, you're doing grand
hold on for all will be ok
you're shiny, beautiful soul
will be restored one day.