I walk down a lonely road leading just over a hill, an open field revealing a bluish and purple sky at twilight. I've walked this road many a time before. It is the road of my childhood: a road I walked when I lived in the house at the start of this once dirt road now paved. Having returned here but for a night, I see that things have changed dramatically since leaving in my early adolescent years.
Walking the road, following its curves around passed the overgrown field where once ripe fruits and vegetables grew, I came upon an old farm house. It, too, was overgrown and taken over by cudzu. It was in shambles and the rusted tin roof had caved in. A tractor and a beat-up old pickup truck were also victims of the cudzu, standing half-viewable as testiments to better days. Standing in front of this shack of a house, I had reached the end of the road, where the paved path had all but turned to dirt and soil surrounded by thick, green grass. An end, it seemed, though this place was not my destinationa. In fact, i walked a little further than I had intended out of curiosity. I knew the farmer that once lived here, though not that well. A little sad to see the ruinationa of such fertile crops of a life lived, now faded into yesteryear, I turned around and proceeded to the center of the nearby field where I had actually wanted to explore.
It wasn't far, as I backtracked some of the road, walking to where the rocky dirt path met smooth asphalt. It was there that I stood, thinking as to whether or not I wanted to venture into the grass and weeds that was as tall as me. The field had grown up and without the farmer, there was no one to cut it down to size. Looking into the distance over the top of the grass to see a wide clearing where there once was a big, shadowy-green forest, I decided to make my way through. I wanted to see what it was like in the area where the mighty forest of my adolescence once covered.
Through the tall grass that brushed against my baggy gray t-shirt and my loose-fitting jeans, I walked for a good bit until i reached a large clearing where the tall grass ended, where wilder things once grew. Now, after all these years away from the magical place of my roots, I find that there isn't much left after what my grandparents (who live next to the house I once called home at the beginning of the street) said about the tornados that tore through here and the landscaping crews that cleared the rest of the forest after cleaning the tornado's debris...
I walked on, remembering how this place once was before all of these changes, and soon, it was as if I found myself right back in those days before I left this place. I knew, then, that I would have to go and that my days here were numbered. I spent all the spare time I could here in this once secret, secluded meadow, not knowing that I would return here one day to find it part of an open, vast valley cleared of all its trees and bushes. Yet, here I was, back in a time more innocent and full of hope and promise. I could hear the echoes of laughter and play that so often filled this large, bright green meadow. It was here that I had many a fun summer day, as well as here that I came when grappling with the growing pangs in my becoming an adult.
I can't believe everything that I have experienced since leaving this place. I am just as changed as this very place of seemingly lost youth. I think to how I had felt uprooted when my mother remarried and we were to move pretty far away from this refuge of days filled with the things most precious in life. Scenes of yesterday past, flash before my eyes as my memory starts to nudge at my attentiona, reminding me of days that felt very much bitter sweet. I remember the day I left, I didn't think things would ever be the same for me. In many ways, I was right.
That's the moment I felt a pang well-up in my throat. That's the moment I felt as if I had not left...not yet. My eyes teared up, now all blurry with nostalgia, thinking back to a life yet lived. My thoughts were awkwardly searching for a feeling in all I've discovered...awkwardly seeking the words that may define this very moment. I found none. What came to mind instead, are those things I'd say if I could just talk to the me that was there, ready to leave---the me then, that had ventured forth into the wide world of wonder and uncertainty to see what destiny awaited.
THe sunny day's heat and humidity had all but given way to the cool night air. THe sun had set and the light had faded, leaving me to the all too present shadows that grow and stretch as the night settled in, blanketing the meadow. At once, I fought back the feelings that were swelling up inside of me as I watched the darkness of night bring back some glimmer of magic that once filled this place. It was suddenly a place of wonder again. I had not come here during such late hours before except once or twice, each time during difficult experiences in my life: Once when my mother and my adopted father were fighting and deciding to divorce; the other time when I found out that I'd have to leave my most close friends behind and move to an entirely new and bigger place. Both of those times, I felt a deep loss, though neither were of the loss I had felt in returning here once again.
It's been seven years since my pressence graced this place of memory and dreams. This place, for awhile, had become my "Dream Country"...a place I went in my mind when facing difficult choices in the life I created in leaving home and venturing into the world. It has been too long since my eyes, ears, and body had been here to see this place, to hear the wild and untamed sounds that now return with the night. I feel my moderately long, light-brown hair tickle my neck as the wind blows through it. I can see a clear, starry night beaming down at me with radiant moonlight. Everything seems to have this shadowy, irredescent blue glow of night all around. It is in that moment, in looking across the meadow as I remember it all those years ago, I see a silhouette in the distance.
Walking nearer to investigate I see that it appears to be a boy gazing up at the sky as I just had been, myself. Upon even closer inspectiona I am surprised to see the apparitiona of a younger me. Immediately, I feel the sharp pangs of such jumble of emotiona rise inside of me. I wasn't sure what to say or do or think...all it seemed I could do was just stand there and gaze upon the visage that was my immortal youth. I know what he was thinking, that much was startling clear in my mind as my memory returned to me as vividly as that night stood before me with such wonder and grace. The things I could share with that me, then...If he only knew what awaited him. If he only knew the choices that he is to make...
As he---the younger me---looked away from the sky, his short-haired head turning swiftly in my directiona, it was as if he can see me as lucidly as I can see him. It's like he felt my pressence. Me---he, walks towards me, eyeing me up in the pale moonlight with what appears as the utmost curiosity. He seems as intrigued as me, though I believe I am the most stunned of the two of us.
"I..." I start to get out, but feel the lump in my throat throb as I hold back the rising emotionas. I'm only hoping he doesn't see the streaks of tears on my cheeks gleam in the moonlight. I find it difficult to speak, though he breaks the awkward silence with a tone denoting that he somehow knew he'd find me here.
"This is a difficult time for me. I...I feel very afraid." This younger ghost of me tells me very frankly and very honestly.
"I..." Again, I become very aware of the lump in my throat that I try my best to push down, holding back even more tears that water into the tiniest of puddles in my eyes. I hope this is not very visible to him. It seems to me that I need to be the strong one. I have been places and seen things that that untainted and pure me has yet to experience.
"I guess..." he looks down then, back up to gaze into my eyes. Why can I not speak? Why is this so difficult for me? I mean, here I am presented with the nightshade of innocense. It's so surreal...like...like I have stumbled into a poem of some sort.
"I guess, I just wanna know that no matter what happens...it'll all be alright?" He asks, just standing there looking at me. I can't believe this is happening, let alone such feelings arise from some unseen place within the depths of my being. It feels there is more communicationa occurring here than the verbal speaking.
"I..." fighting back the tears and emotionas with all I have, hoping to understand them and more properly address to them at a later time, I muster all my resolve and hopefully give the answers this lost soul needs. "I can say that everything will be okay." My mind is flooded with so many things I want to say: so many words of wisdom to impart, so many cautionaings and advice, but where to start? Where do I even begin?
"So...what's it like? Where you are at? What's it like?" He asked out of curiosity about his dreams not yet born. He was looking to me to show him that he shall succeed and that all his feelings are not in vein.
"It's...complicated, kinda. I'm not really sure what to say. I mean, there is so much to share with you...so many chances and opportunities...so many things that can..." I stop dead in my tracks as many of the emotionas that was tugging at my heart and soul, begging for expressiona, suddenly ceases in this very moment. It's as if there is no future, just the here and now---us and our choices. We just stand there gazing at one another with a knowing of our place in the world---in all the myriad of worlds to come in some near, yet distant future. It's as if I...it's as if we suddenly feel our perfect place in the universe. Instantly, in this fleeting moment of clarity, it's as if things aren't so complicated...at least, it does not have to be.
"I wouldn't be too afraid; there isn't really much to fear, if anything at all."
"What if I don't find love? What if I don't succeed with my writing or drawing? What if i'm stuck in some dead-end job I don't like? What if I one day look to these very stars, but with regret about a life not lived?"
His words...his questionas: the very ones I remember asking myself as I looked to the stars in the heavens much like we look, now, to the sparkles in each of our eyes. There exploded a moment of silence like a big bang, that seems to last an eternity. He and I aren't so different---both of us at a very familiar place where everything seems so out of control and uncertain. With a growing need to speak, each of us obviously on the edge of shattering the silence, it was finally me who spoke...
"Everything is going to be okay. You will find yourself; no need to worry. Though, I will say that I have discovered...your journey: whatever it may be for you, wherever it may take you...it is not a matter of finding yourself, but...instead, it is a matter of deciding for yourself: who you want to be, what you want outta life, who you want to love, and what you want to feel...what you want to experience." I explained, hoping to help in someway, whatever this youthful me is to do after this moment of meeting. I could see him processing the informationa; I can see the gears turning in his head.
"What is it that you've experienced? What have you seen? What have you done? Have you given witness to these very dreams that I will try with all my might to see happen? Do you..." and he hesitated with such bashful hope. I can see he is slightly afraid to ask, but manages to find the courage to ask anyway, as I felt he would. I know what his questiona is and I'm not sure what to tell him...
"...do you live the dream?"
I looked at him for a moment and saw him struggle with enthusiasm, though I could see that he was trying not to give way to the possibility of disappointment.
"Not quite sure how to put this. Uhm...I have my own challenges...you have yours, they are ours as you are me and I am you, but...in a weird paradox you may or may not understand now: my challenges are not yours. They can be, but I am not your only future as you are not my only past. I see that now. We are not meeting here, now, to see what lay ahead for us or to foretell some predetermined future. I see in your eyes that Your choices are your own, as mine are mine and mine alone. As difficult as it is to accept, it is one of the rare truths in this world, as most of what people usually call truths, are mostly relative. I hate to say this, and it may be quite zealous of me..." I hesitate for a moment, thinking to myself whether I should impart one of the greatest realizationas I have made in all of my sojourn...
"I wouldn't wait around for seas to part or messiahs to come. I wish you the best of luck in all you choose, but I would like to share some of my recent experiences. I have recently begun to come to grips with the idea that no one can tell me who I am nor is there anyone who can tell me what is right, what is wrong, what is the best actiona to take; there is no one to decide anything for me, but myself. This has been a hard pill to swallow, but...I choose to accept this for myself. That is one of my greatest challenges and also, one of my greatest adventures. You may seek answers in love, in employment and career, or even other types of gain or expressiona, but what really matters most, to me anyway, is the connectionas..." I feel a deep affectiona for that picture of purity before me. I feel just as confused and disoriented as he does in everything we are experiencing. Yet here we are...
I stand here, awaiting any response, prepared for mostly anything. THere is nothing but silence that fills the space between us as wide as the distance twixt the very stars that twinkle above us, shining so brightly. It is then that I cannot seem to find the words as that me of yesterday, looks again, to the stars. I stand there, watching as he turns around, looks up to me in passing, and walks through the open clearing of the forest and disappears out of sight into the shadows of the night. It is that very path that I, too, leave the meadow through. It is not so shadowy for me as it was for the me of all those years ago. The forest was not there and the lights from the street lamps and moonlight shined freely over the area.
In leaving, I can't believe that this is the fruits of what was my eden. In returning here, I now have a few more puzzle pieces to this puzzle I have been trying to piece together. I had not the heart to tell that everso hopeful and challenged me, that those dreams of his, died for me a long time ago. I couldn't tell him that I had reached dream's end and of all the struggles I have been through. I do know that there are other choices and optionas, for him...and I see now that there is just as much potential and hope and promise for me as there is for him. The only difference twixt me now and me then is that I once looked to the stars, hoping that they could give me answers---tell me many things, like why they shine; now...I look to the heavens where dwells all of the stars and know that it is up to me to make those stars shine. All in all, I see the youthful vulnerability and innocense as gates to eden. In returning, I may explore these elements and remember what all of this is about.....
Jeremy Key was born and raised in the rural country of Walker County, Alabama. He moved to California at age 18 to follow his dreams. He has since met with much success and much failure, and lives again in Tuscaloosa, Alabama where he writes and loves and owns his own business.
"Return to Eden" is copyright, Jeremy Key 2005, all rights reserved.
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