Saudade

I picked up a new word today. The word is Portuguese, and funnily enough there is no translation for it in any other language. This word is also proof that words are not enough to express whatever it is we are feeling because I am feeling "Saudade" and there isn't a word in a language I speak that could describe what that means. However much I want to express myself in words all the time some things can neither be expressed just as much as they can't be explained. Translating "Saudade" might not be possible, but explaining it can be. As far as I understood "Saudade" is a feeling of deep nostaligia and reminiscence of someone or something that can never be recaptured. As it turns out "Saudade" is therefore a huge extension in my dictionary because I have felt it millions of times in my life but never had a word to express it with. Just because there is no word for it doesn't mean it doesn't exists though. Being a writer should have taught me that.

There are three kinds of people: those that live in the past, in the present or in the future. Throughout my life I have struggled to live in the present although I want nothing more than to belong to that group of people. While my past wasn't that extensive I was largely living in the future, always having dreams and using the present merely to make them come true. Now that life has struck and most of these dreams haven't come true and I can no longer use the present to make them happen because the past is what defines the future I am more and more becoming a person that looks back and remembers the time when things were still possible. On top of that the past has a tendency of reminding one of the good things rather than the bad so that it is easier to love the life of the past retrospectively than it was when the past was still the present. Consequently, looking back can hurt sometimes.

That might exactly be what "Saudade" is. It's hard for me to imagine that I will never be able to recapture the moments that have passed. I have never been a person that took "You can't do this" easily. I always thought I can do anything if I tried hard enough. Unfortunately, that is not the case! It outright blows that in seven years I will have spent half of my life without my father and I will never see him again although he's the reason I exist. However much I want to see him again I will never succeed. But even with far less dramatic and melodramatic ambitions I might not be successful because of the past I have lived. The best years of my life were in Dundee which I know now but failed to realize sometimes while I was still living them because someone was bullying me or because I got a C. Thinking that I will never be able to relive the love I had for that time is heartbreaking although I wouldn't want to be there now.

So I wouldn't actually switch the present for the past. I am glad I'm evolving and that new things happen. If I was still as old as I am now and still in the same place I was four years ago I'd be very unhappy. However, the memory is painful and not altogether pleasant. I'd certainly do a few things differently but that has nothing to do with "Saudade". I don't want the past to be my present or future but the fact it is gone forever is a harsh reality. As my present right now is nothing to be desired I have to focus on the future. In order for a future to happen I will have to use my present more wisely though. Because that is very hard to do "Saudade" overcomes me sometimes. The only feeling that overcomes me even more often than "Saudade" is its antithesis: anticipation of the future. I am more excited about what is to come than I am reminiscent of what has passed. I can only consider it pure luck that it is that way...