Being There

This, I imagine, is how it begins.


An entire day spent in silence, readjusting a junk sofa; laying down new rugs and wiping vomit from the old ones.

This is what you never wanted; what so many of you fear.

It is alone.

Not the adjective and not the adverb, but rather the thing itself. It is, for lack of a better description, the genesis of a solitary noun.


It is… orange leaves outside of a window.

Sirens wailing towards Devon.

The gurgle of a seldom used fountain; the collapse of a soap dish unable to carry its burden alongside the tiled bathroom wall.


It is the sight and the sound and smell of autumn; everything falling and crunching and wailing to its own chord.


It is beautiful and sad. It is solitude with little more than a waning desire to be otherwise.


It is giving up.


It is the nauseating understanding of difference; the realization that, hermit or not, there is a profound difference between having the choice of company (youth) and none at all (present).


And it pushes on your chest, dripping your lifeline into the pit of your stomach, pounding to the beat of old memories and moments. Laughs and pranks and walks and sundry other moments where you were not — by any superficial definition of the word — alone.


But time is a lion, leaving in its wake a path of beautiful destruction.


People grow. They marry. They have children. The children grow.


Everyone older and older, their faces dropping from the only circle you’ve known. And so it goes: you are alone, in the middle of everything.


God forbid you should ever wake up to realize what I have: that there’s seldom a need for a telephone. No need for stationery and blank CDs. No need for vocal chords or complete dinette sets.

You will stay where you are while the world spins on; stopping and demanding you dance at their convenience. And yet: otherwise forgetting your face; your name; your voice.


And that, perhaps, is your problem. Your Achilles heel, as it were.

You are always there.



Waiting and helping. Helping and waiting. Like a piece of furniture that brings comfort after a long day, with scarce occasion for reciprocity.


But when the world does indeed comes crashing down — as it most assuredly will — and your ears ache with the sort of silence that only tinnitus knows.

No one — no one — will be there to hear you scream. No one will rub your feet or bring breakfast in bed. No one will answer their phone or call for random hello’s.

And this, I imagine, is the replicating middle. The climax to a story with no denouement except for the endless repetition of the silence; the solitude; and the fury.

But the question remains:

How does it end? How do you break out of the cycle and rebirth yourself into the happy happy joy joy of the faces around you?


It is the hardest feat of them all. An action so Herculean in effort that you can scarcely imagine the thought.


You will have to turn to someone you love and say, anguish dripping from your cheeks, that, no

I cannot be there for you.

Not ever again.


And until you accomplish this one, great disaster of your life, there is only this:


the beginning, the middle and the end – consistent only in their unraveling.

Goldilocks: Brief Encounters of the Third Kind

Part I
One needn't be blond to suffer from Goldilocks Syndrome:

The indefatigable quest to find your niche (notch) in the world: to find a place where you fit in, where you are comfortable.

And I need that now more than ever — to feel that at least one fleeting aspect of my life is "just right."

And yet:

I am too liberal for conservatives; too conservative for liberals.

Too tall for petites; too short for regulars.

Too hippie for squares; too square for hippies.

Rich enough for expensive tastes; too poor to accommodate them.

Base enough for certain instincts; too moral (or uptight, depending on your interpretation) to act on them.

Full of words without the means to organize them.

Obsessed with photography without genuine ability.

Exhausted in the mornings; unable to sleep at night.

Too rural for the city, too urban for the country.

Part II
And I feel as though — no matter where I am, and no matter the crowd — I fail, and desperately so, to belong.

Like last night, sitting next to the only empty seat in the house: my presence noted by conspicuous absence, and so diminished when the show was over and I attempted to work my way through a crowd of people that never saw me coming.

"Excuse me," I would say. "Excuse me."

But I was invisible again — a blurred face among many — a reality which transformed my solitude into an ineffable queasiness in the pit of my stomach.

Once again, though, the train ride offered the mostly unlikely sort of contrast: my seat was "just right" until the car started to fill and a newcomer sat down beside me.

I shifted my bag and my book to give him ample room, but felt his eyes wandering to my pages as we shuffled on towards our many stops.

"What do you think of that book?" he asked, the alcohol on his breath and the redness of his eyes unmistakable signs of the evening.

From there we conversed, talking about literature and film — an oddly decent single-serve conversation — before he nudged my leg with the back of his hand and said, "Well, this is my stop."

In that instant I offered a hurried goodbye, marveling at how the only people who have seen me in the past two weeks would most assuredly not remember our encounter by morning.

And that, I suppose, is where I fit in.

Somewhere between the stops — the spaces. Somewhere between two chords in a piece of music, or the background to a painting noted for its foreground.

It is there, nestled between the gin and the tonic, that I reflect again on those words spoken to me by the man who sideswiped my vehicle earlier this month:

"I'm sorry," he said to me then. "I just didn't see you there."

The World Spins Madly On

When I was five or six — I can't say for certain how old — I watched a film (or perhaps an episode of the Twilight Zone) about a girl who would sleep for months at a time, waking on occasion and rising from bed as though only the night had passed.

And in this manner her whole life was a dream: entire days lost to sleep, with so few life experiences to mark her existence.

For years this film would haunt me, my earliest childhood fears circulating around cancer, nuclear war and — yes — sleeping my life away.

Whether rational or otherwise, the fact remains that these fears were very real to me — reason enough to remain awake at night, in fact, terrified that by the time I awoke, the world would have continued on to a brilliant pace without me.

And today, some years later, I tell you: that story was no work of fiction. And yet: as much as I strove to avoid such a fate, it appears to have fallen firmly and irresolutely upon my chest, the weight of it some mornings making it nearly impossible to breathe.

I feel it now — typing to the blanket "you" of this fiber optic universe — marveling only at how the magnetic force of this... nothing and everything... has gathered now into the pit of my stomach (the gravitational consequence of attempting to sit up, I think), leaving all other nooks, crannies and extremities to their own, hollow devices.

I am awake now and yet: still asleep. Love and lifetime lost to a nightmare that knows no rest.

The Road Mistaken

Very seldom do things work out precisely as you plan. You will find yourself loving people you'd never planned on loving and staying in places you'd never intend to stay.



But this is life, and you can take it or leave it — as the cliche goes — and so long as you're avoiding the latter, you may as well make the best of whatever time you have.


But sometimes it is... difficult. Like listening to one of your favorite musicians belt out one of your favorite songs, experiencing the moment as if only by proxy


Your hands too often on the shutter


As though wanting to share a moment that is — you acknowledge with a sigh — entirely your own.

But there are others all around you. Hundreds upon hundreds, your uncommon life experiences most common among this crowd.

The consensus undeniable as a stranger turns to you during intermission and says, "So what do you think so far?"

"Brilliant," you tell him. "But then again — I've never known them to disappoint."

From there two strangers politely converse, united for a moment by a shared fondness for sound and a fear of passing time in silence.

But no moment lasts forever, and with the end of intermission — and then the encore — you rise from your seat and turn from one another as if strangers again.

"So this is life," you think, joining the crowd in a chest-to-back rush for signs marked "EXIT."

You look over your shoulder and return your mind to the empty stage, a little sick to note that the one once closest to you

is now the furthest away.

Pushed (To the Periphery)

The start of every day is eerily similar to the last.

My alarm goes off with grand intentions, and I hit the snooze every 9 minutes for an hour or so until I have no choice but to crawl out of bed and let the day begin.

And yet: in the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that in terms of restful sleep... there's hardly any difference between one day and the last.

What varies, though, is the "or so" referenced above. The amount of time I snooze, which thus determines how quickly I need to scramble to get ready for work... and thus the hour at which I hop into my car and begin my commute.

And this, in turn, can result in a small but significant change in the rest of my day.

You see, though my morning schedule varies as much as 40 minutes on any given day, the world around me seems to keep pace with a far more reliable clock.

If I leave on time, my neighborhood is all but silent. If I leave a few minutes late, parents are dropping off children at a nearby school, their vehicles sometimes blocking me in. After that, a group of kids have gathered outside of school, waiting for a bus to arrive and take them elsewhere.

And if I leave later than that, a guy in an overcoat sometimes nods a hello as he rounds the corner and makes his way to the train (or so I imagine his path leads).

The people out walking their dogs change. The joggers change, everyone keeping rhythm to a clock that seems somehow to defy me.

And so begins my day.

***But there's this boy.

There's this boy, and whenever I see him my day belongs to someone else — to him — and I fear that he may never see. ***The first time I saw him, he was walking down the sidewalk alone, pale white legs scrawny in spite of the overstuffed book bag that had him hunched at the shoulders.

He kept his eyes down; whether because of the world weighing on his mind — or the pounds of books in his pack — I couldn't immediately determine.

In any event, he kept walking on to school, eyes down. Shoulders hunched. And always on his face there was that indiscernible look of a child going to a place they'd rather not.

He approached the swarm of classmates that had beat him to school. They talked to each other over and around him, his arrival met with no "hello's" or "how are you's."

No one even looked at him. ***I've seen him a few times since then, and always it's the same thing: whether I see him approaching school, or he's already there amongst them, or he's just walking up...

It's the same overstuffed backpack. The same gait. And always — always! — that same, heartbreaking look upon his face. ***Today, I am sorry to report, was no different.

Except for this:

A mountain of leaves had been swept into a pile along the sidewalk, no doubt in preparation for the crews making their rounds around the city. Kids were laughing and kicking at the pile, imitating the act of jumping into them. Leaves were breaking loose from the pile, scattering despite some laborers hard work.

And there, feet upon feet away from his classmates, was the boy.

Standing in the street, between two parked cars. His back turned to the excitement, his face tilted up just enough for me to realize, for the first time, that he has a faint hint of freckles.

He's waiting for the day to be over, I thought. He's waiting for it to be over, and it hasn't even begun.

He scarcely moved as cars buzzed past. Scarcely moved and yet: it was much to my relief that he didn't. I was half-afraid he'd take one step forward — whether by intention or oversight — whenever a vehicle approached. ***He's a clean kid with simple (but otherwise good) looks. A little on the thin side, but not unhealthily so. And though his clothes aren't exactly the cutting edge of fashion, it's easy enough to discern that someone at home is taking decent care of him.

But why, then, does no one see him? Why is his backpack so full, when the others scarcely have a notebook to their name? And why, for the love of God, does no one talk to him?

I wonder if his parents talk to him. I wonder if his teachers talk to him. And I wonder what's better: endless taunting by schoolyard bullies, or finding yourself surrounded by names and faces and voices that refuse — always — to acknowledge you exist. ***Despite my hermetic and anti-social tendencies (coupled with my class clown persona), I was lucky enough to always have friends. To never really be the subject of scarring ridicule (siblings notwithstanding), even as I shrunk away from the crowd and retreated to my books.

And yet: whenever I see this boy, I cannot help but think it should come as no surprise that I most identify with him.

That of the hoards of kids that regularly gather there, his is the only face I remember.

No Exit

The city doesn't always sound so ugly; so busy. You just have to know where to look, and when.

Like jogging along side streets late in the evening, when lamp posts have gone about their work of casting shadows (oak, maple, etc.) against brick buildings.

I wonder sometimes when I'm fighting the urge to stop and observe further -- which would subsequently interrupt my jog -- if it's normal to marvel at these things. If it's normal to chuckle every time I see a "Speed Hump" sign. If it's normal to sometimes be so in awe of a tree's reflection that I can barely keep pace with my own shadow.

I sometimes worry, nauseous, that I'm on the verge of a sensory overload: like when I stop dead in my tracks and pause to listen to everything. To soak in the image of yellow leaves with a blue-gray sky behind them. Or as with tonight:

To clench my fists and rest my head upon them. To sit on a city bench and just wait -- hope -- that I'd fall asleep.

Wake up.

And find that days upon days had passed.

Tempus Fugit, Part IV

And then, sometimes, you walk — not run — around the city.

You leave your iPod at home and tune in to the sound of the wind beating across the water and banging American flags against metal poles; the whirl of cars sweeping by, one after the other all along Lake Shore Drive. The blare of horns from angry taxi cabs and the anxiety of small children hungry for dinner.

But the sun is low by this point, and by the time it's gone the people are, too. So it's just you, and the sounds, the waves and the no swimming sign. There's the pier, and small dunes, and electric light reflected from tall buildings.

And it hits you, standing there, absorbing and perceiving, that you haven't been fair —

Haven't been fair at all.

That it is not — despite your protests — the city that you so despise.

But rather your life in it.

***

Yesterday a co-worker and I went to REI, one of few stores at which I actually enjoy shopping. She and her husband have decided to take up snowshoeing and hiking and maybe even camping, and though I am by no means "seasoned" in any of these things, they are most certainly among my favorite past-times.

As we wandered around the store I realized I'm not quite the novice I once was. I gave her advice on supplies for all of the above. Looked at packs and explained which ones were for day hikes, which ones were for back country, etc. I explained hydration packs, and showed her which poles she'd need with her snowshoes. Told her the secret to zipping two sleeping bags together, and said (forgive me, REI) that for their purposes they could find cheaper tents elsewhere.

Don't get me wrong: I'm no expert on camping or hiking or snowshoeing or anything for that matter. But it felt strange, later, when I realized just how natural it was for me to talk about these things, how easy it was for me to offer tips to someone with less experience.

Like driving six miles from home in a busy part of the city last night, a feat that would've terrified me even just a year ago. But I did it all the same, arriving at my destination without a compass or a road map or even breaking a sweat.

Me: the same girl who once drove for hours trying to go to a friend's party just ten miles away. Me: the same girl who nearly won a Darwin Award for her hiking travails in the Blue Hills. Me: the same girl who nearly drove over a frozen Walden Pond in an attempt to find it.

That's not to say I don't still get lost — I do.

But in very different ways.

***

Today is Halloween. People are in costume, offices are decorated, and at 10 a.m. a group of kids will start circling around, opening their bags with silent pleas for candy (most kids these days can't be bothered to forge those three magic words).

TANGENT: Whenever I type the word "forge," I instinctively add a "t" to the end. Thank goodness for backspace.

I didn't decorate, though I thought about it. I didn't come in costume, though I have one at home. Everyone's excited, and the whole office is abuzz with chatter. There will be a party at lunch time, and contests, and photos and at one point the day will be over. Tomorrow will arrive, and with it the task of undoing the day before.

The ritual tearing down of the celebration. My least favorite part of every holiday, of every gathering.

The long wheeze of a balloon slowly deprived of its helium.

***

And then, yes, there will be lunch.

But you will sneak away minutes before with your shopping list of shaving cream, lotion and No Doz.

You will fill your tank with gasoline for the possibility of road trips, and empty your wallet for an uncertain gift.

And you will sneak back, quieting away to your desk in hopes that you can avoid the questions:

"Aren't you hungry?" they'll ask.

"Yes," you imagine your response. "Very much so."

And they will point you in the direction of food line, never understanding that that is not what you meant.

Not what you meant.

At all.

The Next Gasp

Now for a limited time, you can see the Louvre (or a reasonable facsimile) without updating your passport.

And so people came in by the bus loads Saturday, filling the parking lot and cramming into the entryway to purchase their tickets for this special exhibit.

But it was too nice a day to spend indoors, if you ask me. Never mind that I hadn't been to this particular museum in nearly a decade — and never mind it's not often I make it back "that way" — try as I might, I just couldn't bring myself to walk through those big glass doors for anything other than the occasional restroom break (in which case: thank goodness for free public art).

You see, the Indianapolis Museum of Art has a rather impressive general collection — particularly relative to the size of the city — but it also has one sizable advantage over most other art museums: it isn't landlocked by concrete.

So not only is general admission free, but the surrounding gardens are free for the traipsing. And so: rather than find myself alone among a sea of faces inspecting ancient Roman art... I kept to the trails, where I was (quite literally) alone with my thoughts.

***For 90 minutes, there was no one but me. No one but me and, for a brief 30 second encounter, an old man who shuffled his feet to walk. We smiled at each other: he as he exited the greenhouse, and me as I stooped down to photograph random wildflowers (forgive me, I don't know the names of most things).

We walked onward to our respective destinations: that proverbial nowhere and everywhere, just... wandering... hoping (or so I imagined) our random paths might lead to whatever it was we were looking for.

And I did find something out there that day: things I'd forgotten about. The sound of my footsteps crunching over leaves and through pebbles. The smell of an autumn breeze jaunting around the bend. The chattering squirrels and the occasional shout of a child somewhere far off in the distance: ("Look, Mom! A waterfall!").

It is funny how these sounds sometimes echo, rousing us out of that proverbial lethargy as quickly as they return us to it. Waking and sleeping, waking and sleeping...

You keep walking; thinking. You shake your head so as to work loose the toxins, but find yourself stumbling upon the same thoughts and images time and again.

You bend down to pick up a red leaf, its chlorophyll restricted to the ravine along its veins. You spin it stem-first between your thumb and your index, drinking in the smell of it before you return it to the ground (but this time: a little off the path, so no one steps on it) and move onward, as before.

Just walking. And thinking. And kicking dust up with your shoes, filling the air with fog and your lungs with the painful anticipation of your next breath, which you fear — somehow — may never come.

On Distance

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time. ~T.S. Eliot

---

The distance between two points — any two points — is interminable. In which case, Zeno was at least half correct.

Imagine, if you will, two objects located at coordinates immediately next to each other, separated only by the tiniest fraction of space.

At first glance, these points are a negligible distance apart; infinitesimal, even. But if the objects at these points — people, for example — proceed in opposite directions, running into a variety of attractions and distractions along the way, it may be an eternity before they meet again. But an eternity, by definition, is endless. And so essentially synonymous with never.

But it's possible, right? It's possible for these two objects to continue on in a straight line, never straying from their "Y" coordinates, for example, and at some point in time, to meet again head on, collapsing into one other?

It's like using Mapquest to find the shortest distance between you and your destination, and then doing the exact opposite of what you're told. For example: traveling east until you arrive, when a drive five miles west would've taken you there in minutes.

It's a wonder — a miracle, really — that we should ever really arrive anywhere.

In other words: even when we appear to be near something (someone), in nearly all respects we're actually quite far apart.

It is for this reason that — even among crowds, even among family and friends — that we can sit beside another living, breathing object and feel so entirely distant.

So alone.

Thank You for Reminding Me Why I'm Such a Loner

So I'm walking through the cafeteria when I see this female, about my age, standing and talking to a group of three other females, also about my age.

The conversation was visibly jovial, and ended when the girl who was standing said "I'll talk to you guys later," smiled a big smile, and walked away.

As soon as she walked on, the remaining three faces drastically changed their expression. They huddled together, one of them laughing, and I heard the words "Did you notice she..." as I continued past them just out of earshot.

I walked on to the ice dispenser; filled my "Life is Good" Nalgene bottle; and returned to my desk, where I ate my sandwich, surrounded only by photographs and dog-eared book pages.