Treading the Paths of my Youth...

I've just suffered the most profoundly painful experience. At the weekend, I got a letter addressed to me, but really intended for the band I ran before I moved to Yeovil. Which necessitated my going there tonight to give them the letter.

The week thus far has therefore been dominated by one question: what would I find there? When I left the band, it was in reasonably good health, but as often happens when a strong leader leaves, the band then suffered a bit of a tough time, with a number of prominent people leaving. And then I lost touch completely. So, what would be there?

Well, I was pleased to find the band in good health, probably slightly stronger than when I left. Many of the students I taught are still there, and they've improved noticably (a good thing, really - it's been almost two years!). There are also a number of new people, who seem keen to take the band forward, with an ambition of competing in two years. And the core remains strong. Celia is still there, but she seems to have essentially delegated all the tasks of actually running the band, and teaching the drums - which is a good thing, since at 84 she isn't really fit to be dealing with snotty kids.

So why was it so painful?

Being back at that band served as a strong reminder that, once upon a time, I was young, and Good, and if not happy then at least content. I achieved more there every week than I've managed in the last two years, and I actually mattered there, where now the world would miss me not at all if I simply ceased to be. It hurts to think of how far I've fallen.

Compounding the problem, Celia and the new pipe major made a point of asking me if I wanted to come back. The pipe major even offered to step aside in my favour, as if that would be what I wanted. It was horrible seeing that hope in Celia's eyes, as I knew I had to refuse, and the reasons I gave sounded really hollow in my own ears even as I gave them.

But how do you explain? There are three real reasons I can't go back. The first is that it wouldn't work - unless I were pipe major I could only be poison for the band, and as we know, when a manager goes back for a second stint it's never as good as the first time. The second is that shortly after I left, there was a problem between the band and my brothers, where the band made the mistake of demanding money from them for the right to come and help the band out at their engagements in the year. And, although all the people in the band who made this mistake are now gone, there's still unresolved hurt there that would make any return difficult to justify.

But the real reason is that I'm just not that person any more. Before I left, I was not only running that band, but was instrumental in the running of another band, and was basically running the top section at the local BB company. I was out every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. And getting even a week off was extremely problematic. People were reliant on me; I had to be there. Naturally, that left no time for relationships; it didn't even leave time for me to look.

But that was okay. I had a promise that things would work out ("if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us."). That held firm even when I lost out on a chance with a girl I really liked, simply because I just could not make the time. Had I known that it would be three years before I next went on a date, my priorities would have been different, and to Hell with the whole world, but never mind that. I was reasonably sure I was where God wanted me, doing what God wanted me to do, and He would be faithful in time.

But the man who went to Yeovil was not the same man who returned. I simply do not have that faith any longer. ("Which of you, if his son asks for... a fish, will give him a snake?") She exposed how alienated I was, how isolated I had allowed myself to become, and how wretchedly lonely my life is. She offered me just a glimpse of happiness... and then took it away.

The thing is, even that I could have dealt with. But for the last year, every time I have met a girl who is even interesting, that very moment she has moved jobs, become a missionary to Outer Mongolia, or been abducted by aliens. Every single time. (Except one - there was one girl I met the day I had handed in my resignation down south. Somehow, that doesn't help.) Once or twice, and it would have been funny, but not every time for a year.

So, my faith in the promises of God is essentially gone. (Alas, my faith in the existence of God remains, so I can't just become a total hedonist.) And, without that faith, I cannot commit my time and effort to anyone. I won't leave others in the lurch by breaking commitments - but if given the choice now, I choose myself over the world. And so, there's no way back.