The lost opportunities that count most are the ones being lost in this moment.

From Alfred’s journal

Spent most of this morning on the gutter above the Hagen's porch, going over a thing I did not do nine years ago, which was follow the others south when they went. I have told myself the story so many times it has a worn place in it, like a branch where a bird always lands. Switch came up the drainpipe at some point and sat there, and I did not notice how long he waited, and then he left. That was when it occurred to me that the lost opportunities that count most are the ones being lost in this moment, and the thought was less a comfort than a draft under the door. For years I believed regret was at least a kind of attention, that in turning the old thing over I was honoring it. The sun moved off the gutter and I was still there, warm and facing backward.