"Daddy?" "Yes, son." "What does regret mean?"

"Well, son, the funny thing about regret is, it's better to regret something you have done, than something you haven't done.

And by the way, if you see your mother this weekend, be sure and tell her SATAN, SATAN, SATAN!"

Ahh, Butthole Surfers. Is there a finer place to find your personal philosophies? I think not.

A friend and I just finished amusing ourselves by giving each other amateur tarot readings. Very entertaining and completely unenlightening.

However, it did get us on the topic of forgiveness, regret and redemption. For things done or not done. For people hurt, or friendships ended. She's one of the brave souls who, years after ending a relationship with a good man who got hurt, managed to write him an email just to clear the air. Sort of an asking-forgiveness-but-not.

And I wondered... What is the statute of limitations on things like that?

I've been wanting to send an apologetic email to an ex-boyfriend from years and years ago. I was pretty horrible to him, and I know things weren't too great for him for a while (don't feel too badly for him -- he was engaged to someone else within the year).

I'm not looking to unzip a whole can of worms or anything. I'm sure his life is going well (married with at least one kid). But is this completely irrational? Or is this the female version of the High Fidelity, "why did you break up with me" thing? Some strange stop on the road to middle age?

It makes you think...

Or maybe I'm dying -- subconsciously I'm aware of it (hence the annoying amounts of personal reflection), but am loathe to visit the doctor in the event of some confirmation like, "Hey, look -- you're dying. You've got two weeks."

It all boils down to this... When you're down to the last five minutes of your life -- and are running through all the things you regret, etc -- what are the things you could have fixed, changed or apologized for while you were still alive?

And why didn't you do any of them?