Fields of Gold

This song has been running through my mind over the past few days, probably for a couple of reasons. I think it popped back into heavy rotation on the internal jukebox when I was forced to go from happily ensconced to in withdrawal, buoyed by the happy possibility that said ensconcing would happen again at some point in the future:

Will you stay with me, will you be my love

Among the fields of barley

We'll forget the sun in his jealous sky

As we lie in the fields of gold

These fields of gold are a powerful metaphor for me, and sometimes they are necessary just to make it through. I wonder a little bit if they can be dangerous though, too, or at least, from my experience one is wise to leave room for the fields of gold to play out significantly differently in real life than they have in the mind.

One of the ways I learned that lesson is connected to the other reason this song has gotten so much play over the past few days. This is a song that my first love put on a CD that he made me years ago. (The version on that CD was a woman, maybe Eva Cassidy, but I'm not sure.) Having only ever spent one summer together but feeling this strong connection that lasted through the years and suggested the possibility of a great love, I'd listen to these words over and over again:

Many years have passed since those summer days

Among the fields of barley

See the children run as the sun goes down

Among the fields of gold

You'll remember me when the west wind moves

Upon the fields of barley

You can tell the sun in his jealous sky

When we walked in the fields of gold

This summer, we finally had the chance to reunite, and it didn't happen the way it had in my head, or in his. And although we had to deal with some feelings of disappointment and awkwardness, when we let go of that, we did find ourselves walking in fields of gold, just not in the way we'd expected to do it. I haven't heard from him in a little while now, and when that happens, sometimes I just worry a bit. I'm sure he'll resurface again soon. I'm so grateful for all the lessons I've learned along the way through him, and I'm trying to apply them to my present circumstance, knowing that even if my current love won't stay with me and be my love among the fields of Madison, it doesn't mean that we won't walk in fields of gold:

I never made promises lightly

And there have been some that I've broken

But I swear in the days still left

We'll walk in the fields of gold