I inhale a deep breath of fresh air as I roll down my window. I have a deep sense of foreboding as I pass through twilight and into the darkness. As I head west out of town on a cool fall night, all I see is the orange halo of light as the world turns just enough that the volume of its size consumes the last bit of light. As the light fades I feel the heaviness of life press deeper on my heart. I slow down and as the breeze blows through my window I try to settle my soul to the beat of the street lights as they pass by. For me they are the last beacon of hope, for as I pass the last one I can’t help but feel that my life as I know it is over.
As I slow down to turn north onto Blackbend Road, I can’t help but hear the crickets rubbing their wings together. As I speed up their song begins to increase and decrease in volume as they have congregated and so louder and softer they play. Once again I adjust my speed. Once again I match the beat of my heart to the drum beat of nature. Wondering what cadence I might find my happiness in, a tempo that for no apparent reason, just is, it just fits. I near the bend near old man tuckers pond. The symphony of crickets abates as the thunderous base of the bullfrogs begin to tickle my ear drums. I slow down and turn into the small clearing where it all began. I shut my old pickup truck down and try to calm my soul to Kermit’s 5th concerto and the slow tick as my old motor begins to cool down.
As my interruption slowly fades away, the crickets pick up their song and as happens most of the time in nature, find their place in the song of the frogs. As the frogs sing the base notes the crickets answer with the sweetness of tenor. In doing so they create a rhythm, a pattern, a cadence for me to breath out with the frogs and in with the crickets. I settle into the simpleness of darkness. There is nothing to pull my senses to and fro. Nothing to amplify my anger, or heighten my sadness, just the rhythms of nature to sooth my soul and ground my thoughts to what is or what ought to be.
What kind of masterpiece would this song be though, if the master did not increase to the tempo and lower the tone. I sense more than hear as the song changes. I can’t help but know what comes next. For tragedy is as much of the song as the love story that created it, and with that thought I come back to reality and begin to contemplate the reason that I am here. It seems that my love story is over. We did not drink our poison to die together in our love, we simply flung our poison at each other and our love just simply died. With that thought I feel my gut clench as the sadness overwhelms me. I squeeze my eyes shut and try to hold in the waves of emotion as they ebb and flow with the song that is playing out my window. The conductor brings his song to a climax as one tear finally escapes and I breath deeply to catch my breath. It catches on the way out and as if the audience was calling for an encore. I double over once more and can’t hold on any longer. My sadness flow out of me. I taste the saltiness of my hopes and dreams as they wash down my face and over my lips. I let the song play out and as the last note is played I find myself enveloped in the coldness of silence.
I came to this spot for a reason. Just in front of me is the grassy bank of Tucker’s pond. In the darkness I imagine the soft green carpet bordered by pillars of cat tails whisking back and forth in the slight breeze that comes from the south on warm summer days. I see the two of us sitting on a quilt with our shoes off, laughing at nothing in particular. Finding our joy not in our surroundings or any particular fragrance, or conversation, but finding our joy just being in the presence of each other. Our cadence of love was set by the small ripples in the water, as they ran aground gravity pulled them back to seek level and they would make a small whoosh. Our hearts beat in time with them as we came together in harmony of mind, spirit, and body. As the sun descended on its arch across to the sea, I found my home. I found the cure to my sickness of loneliness, and I was happy.
The movie in my head slowly fades and I am left with the darkness that surrounds me. As the first sliver of the moon begins to rise over the horizon, I am compelled to ask myself what has changed in the last 10 years. The moon inches higher as I contemplate and I am struck with the immensity of its features in the darkness. It is the darkness that is allowing me to see the beauty of its light. I am overcome with an eagerness to try to think about us in our darkness with hopes that I see us in a new light. After careful contemplation, the full moon crests the horizon and is mirrored in those same ripples of a long time ago. It’s time to go home.
As I shut my pickup off I hear the familiar tick, tick, tick. I rest my soul for a second as I contemplate what I want to tell her. In her quiet anger she has left the porch light on. It is beckoning me to its light. From inside my truck I can hear the buzz of the electricity, and feel the tension in my muscles increase as I am nervous to bear my soul. I quietly open the door and inch my way to the ground. From here the light looks a thousand miles away, but this is something that I have to do. I take my first step and just keep going. I fumble the keys out of my pocket and slowly try to get the right key in the right orientation and get the door unlocked. I feel an overwhelming sense of sadness as I crack the door and set my foot down on the worn wood floor that has carried us for the last ten years. I push the sadness away, because I want this space to be filled with the love that it once stood for as I carried her across this same threshold. I want her to want me as much as I want her. I push forward and slowly, so as not to make much noise, close the door behind me.
I stand for a moment and look around the living room. I try to find courage in the moments in our life together. I see the pictures on the wall. The couch that we would sit together and watch movies. I smile a little as I remember that there was always a little more snuggling and a lot less watching movies that always went on. I remember the long passionate kisses in front of the kitchen sink. She always loves when I do the dishes. I think about the spunk that she would give me when I gave her a hard time. I remember love, a lot of it. I turn towards the hallway and take another step towards my life.
I turn the last corner and come face to face with our door. I stop as if to admire the craftsmanship of eighty years ago. I see the ornate glass handle and the skeleton key hole. I look at craftsmanship of the six panels and the detail of the trim that they are set in. I freeze in the moment. What if she doesn’t want me back? I start to breathe heavy, sweat begins to build on my forehead, and my knee’s begin to shake a little. I reach for the handle and in doing so the door begins to rattle as I shake with the fear that not all is right in the world. I try to settle my self, but am hit with a bolt of lightning as I hear a soft call of, “Jack, is that you?”
I can’t hold it in any longer so I slowly push the door open and take the next step to the rest of my life. I turn the lamp on and immediately see that she has been crying. It breaks my heart and I melt to my knees next to her as she lies on the bed. I gently take her hand in mine as gently look into her eyes. I look past the almost translucent blue into her soul and see the everything that made me love her in the first place. For the first time in a while I don’t see the very small part of her that drives me nuts. I see the thousands of things that she is that were the reasons I fell in love with her in the first place. I said, “I need to tell you something.”
“I went to Old Tucker’s pond tonight. I went there with really bad thoughts.”
My eyes started to mist up as I thought about doing the alternative to what I was doing now. I had to catch my breath as I almost gaged at the thought of how close I was to losing her. I gently went on.
“As I sat in the darkness, I wondered what had changed in the last ten years. I wondered why we so easily fell out of love.”
I choked up as I said the words, and took a deep halting breath as I tried to steel myself to go on.
“There is no doubt that we have both changed in ways, but a whole lot of you that I fell in love with has stayed the same. The only thing that I can figure out that has changed a lot is our expectations. We both have expectations of each other, but the ones I’m talking about are the ones that change us. For some reason I forgot that what I loved about you the most in the beginning is what I let drive me the craziest now. Somehow I started thinking that you were going to change those things. I forgot that I loved you because of your big heart. So when you used the last of the milk for the neighbors kittens I was furious. Or I forgot that I loved you because you were always willing to stand up for yourself. but when you stood up to me, I no longer loved you for it.”
I choked up on the last sentence and had to catch my breath. I slowly reached up to wipe away the long tears that were traveling down to her chin. I brushed he lips in hopes that at some point I would be able to gently kiss her again. I took a deep breath.
“I don’t know a lot of things, but one thing that I had to realize tonight is that I still love you. I had to remember all of the little things, the not so great things, and the big things. I had to remember them all, because they are all of you. I had to remember that I fell in love with all of you, not just bit and pieces. I had to remember that spunky girl sitting in the grass smiling at me. I had to cut out all of my expectations of who I thought you should be, and remember the person that I fell in love with was you.”
At this point we both have tears running. I pull her close and wrap my arms around her. I can feel her heart beating, and as the crickets start to sing again through the open window our hearts pick up their rhythm. I hug her tightly for a moment and then slowly pull her back so that I can look into the blue.
“what I am trying to tell you is that no matter how much we change, the girl that I fell in love with is still inside of you, and no matter what happens, you are enough.”
As the frogs from our pond joined in for the finale, I gently pulled her close and kissed her with all of the love and tenderness that I have.