I think maybe there's too much attention paid to the whole childhood thing. In a sense I guess it is ... when you grow up you leave people behind, specifically potential lovers. The character remembers having this friend who he had a lot of fun with but had pretty much forgotten. Then something happened to make him just go back and take stock of his life and he remembered all those people he's left behind. But trying to recover the sattellites (the people who have drifted away) is a life-time commitment.
I think maybe there's too much attention paid to the whole childhood thing. In a sense I guess it is ... when you grow up you leave people behind, specifically potential lovers. The character remembers having this friend who he had a lot of fun with but had pretty much forgotten. Then something happened to make him just go back and take stock of his life and he remembered all those people he's left behind. But trying to recover the sattellites (the people who have drifted away) is a life-time commitment.