R is for reminiscence

An A to Z of bits of Bruce
18: Reminiscence

"Regrets, I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention." Ah, Sinatra!

Christmas ... New Year ... the time to get all mushy about looking back. Though, given how I've felt through much of 2008, what I really want to be doing is looking forward. Perhaps I spend too much time, as my father put it in a well-used sermon of his, "looking in the driving mirror".

I don't want this to be about regret, however. That's a strong word. We all remember things that we could have done differently, but here we are. Doesn't regret imply that we'd rather be somewhere else, doing something else?

Looking back is a difficult thing, in any case. There can be a temptation towards an Orwellian rewriting of the past. We either cast ourselves in a better light, blot out our worst moments, and imagine we were better than we were; or we do the opposite, and take the guilt for things that were actually beyond our control.

It's a little like being the type of person who, to me at least, appears to decide that they will feel or not feel a certain way. There is dishonesty in that. Someone who decides how to feel, rather than truly feeling it, must surely be denying to themselves who they really are. In the same way, not accepting the events and decisions of our past for what they were is like a denial of our own identity. And without identity, we are in limbo, unable to see ourselves, unable to move forward.

So reminiscence can be positive, even essential, if used in the right way.

And where did all this come from? I hang my head in shame. From a sequence in It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie, on daytime TV in Britain last week. Everything is going wrong for Kermit and he wishes he had never been born. In the spirit of A Christmas Carol, he is obligingly shown an alternative reality in which he had never been born: Gonzo is an unsuccessful busker, Fozzie is a pickpocket, and Miss Piggy operates a dubious telephone service in an apartment full of cats. Needless to say, seeing such a nightmare scenario, Kermit realises the true value of friendship and thereby manages to save, if not the world, at least his theatre.

So move from regret, to reminiscence, to the future. What have I done to make a difference? How can I make a difference again? Can the Muppet Theatre survive?

With that thought, it will be 2009 in a couple of days. Happy New Year, everyone!