The Possessions of Tragedy

 The television was still on the last channel you were watching. The setting was a freeze frame of you and the world as it was at that moment. For days, it stayed that way as though we were house-sitting for you. There was a dark reality coming, even though the worst possible scenario had already taken place. 

I don't recall how many times I had to walk through the front door before I finally did what had to be done. I was too busy reassembling your last days, hours, weeks, and months. I was awash in memories flooding in from multiple years, whispered into my ears as though they were moments ago.

The feelings I felt were clearly those of an impulsive young man who refused to sit still. Intensity ambushed me from the corners and the closets, settling the score that dealing with everything is inevitable, like it or not. 

Every molecule had to be dealt with, and with it came the emotional burst that accompanied it. We generated your response for every item touched along the way. Those that we separated and packed to take back with us were far easier to deal with than the others, which we immediately assigned as having no value, even though they held value to you. The new normal is a bitter warden.

It is a gauntlet of regret this process. Every choice I made, in which I could have shown you more appreciation, rolled in like a thick, dangerous fog. Navigating these storms of self-deprecating affliction just made the task of taking everything apart even more difficult.

Difficulty eventually gave way to momentum as the calendar days passed, betraying us as we never woke from the nightmare we were living. So we worked with love, defiance, and stoic pacification. 

We fell into a groove, and it felt like we were carrying on for you. We can be so self-deceptive at times; it's hard to trust anything. Then the cold rain came. Again, it was hard to distinguish between the past and the present. Tomorrow was a day we could never imagine; it would come. I firmly believed there was a chance I could die before dawn, and with the pain I was feeling, that would be alright.

Like on autopilot, we marched on diligently, declaring the honor we had, that we were raised among. Every Sunday afternoon, playing as a child on the floor at his feet, his presence just there, all the time, never knowing the gravity of these precious minutes. Riding in the backseat of the car, I have spent a lifetime looking at the rearview mirror, seeing a familiar face, eyes forward. It was a comfort that I took for granted. It turned out that the lifetime was as long as a summer day.

Numbness followed. Just wanting the sadness to be over, we finished it, through to its inevitable end. We somehow erased you. We told ourselves that we were taking part in you in three ways, and while that was true, we still undid your existence. I hated that.

So many years have passed since we had to pick up everything that had some sort of value to you and decide whether it would live or die. The disassembling of someone's life can only be done by those who love them. Yesterday, my family parted with many things that we had been holding onto. It evoked a strange sort of remorse, prompting me to revisit this difficult memory. I think sometimes we just need to be sad because we haven't healed completely. The things unfinished lurk in the shadows, awaiting the obscure call to the light. The ambush commences, and you ride it out, holding onto the sides of the boat.

I dreamed he was alive again over and over. So have my sisters. His life was going to be back for only a certain time. We had taken everything that belonged to him, and now, he had nothing. It is a twisted self-inflicted punishment that we cannot seem to let go of. Those dreams do not come as often anymore, but they still visit from time to time.

What is it about possessions that torments us emotionally? They always remind us that we could have given more to our loved ones. Had we, could the "stuff" have had lesser importance? I don't know. We are strange creatures. We each stumble according to our gifts. 

I know that some day, it will be the things that I have. They will mean something to my children, and they will make decisions. They will keep some and discard others. All I really want for them is to know my love. That is something I can really make happen right here today. 

Safe Haven: Part 13 - The Treacherous Days

 The work that Jus had taken on was intense and sometimes carried with it danger. He jumped in headfirst and immersed himself in it. When he did this, he could lie to himself and tell himself that the trouble building up ten thousand miles away was not real or going to affect him. But every morning, his coffee was tainted with poison images that told him otherwise, and he knew, last November, when he signed that contract, it was not ink that he signed it with, but blood.

It did not seem right. Jus was finally finding his rhythm. He had a full-time job and a side business that he was investing a significant amount of time in. A longtime friend had lost his mind and left his woman in the north without a plan, and even here, Jus did what he could to guide her in her next steps. 

September came, and autumn had that beautiful freshness that Jus had fallen in love with just two years and 5 million miles ago. The planned bivouac weekend arrived, providing a little time for Jus and his comrades to play a game heavily influenced by the Second World War. The hardware was dark green, the equipment was heavy, and the atmosphere was surreal. This was because, without warning, the unit was diverted to the home station. 

Mixed with the bitter morning news that a predator not seen since the early 1970s was moving across the land, tearing hundreds of thousands of people out of their lives and dropping them into an unknown world far, far away, and the tone of the great hall in which everyone was told nothing was going on, when the air was so heavy with the assurance that something was definitely going on. 

It began to feel like incarceration. Jus knew, he had fallen into the trap that he protested only a decade ago. His days of revolution were traded for falling into the ranks that he said he would never be a part of. It was like the end of the movie Hair; he was caught in the vortex, and he knew that he could not escape it.

Photo by Christopher Kuzman on Unsplash

He and his comrades were lined up and sorted out in true processing center fashion as though they had all just joined this insane little endeavor. The General stood before them and repeatedly said, "Nothing is going on." But the more he said it, the more they knew something was definitely going on. All over the news, 600,000 people were plucked out of their lives and dropped in the eastern desert as though a spaceship was just beaming them out of their homes. Jus felt that before the weekend was over, they would be told they could not go home.

The heaviness in the great hall had a severe bitterness to it, like the host had just been beaten before coming out and smiling at the group. Later, the story was told. At 3:00 am Thursday morning, the commander's phone rang. "Get ready, you are on the list, you are going." It was then the detour was crafted, to get everyone ready so when the trigger was pulled and they were sucked out of their lives, they would be squared away. Then, like a twisted draft that the barrel stops on the empty chamber one click short of the bullet, nothing happened.

Sunday afternoon came, Jus and his friends all saddled up upon their fourteen-ton steel horses and rode home, finally able to exhale. They were safe. For now.

Safe Haven Part 12: A Million Miles Away

 Jus arrived home in the middle of the night. The expensive ride home seemed more directionless than he thought it would feel. He thought his homecoming emotionally might be more like the one in October, but this was different. Whatever energy in that unique October through December void in the household was gone. It was like infatuation when you're very young; like smoke, it's gone. 

The daylight brought more uncertainty. There were plans in the works, none of which he made, and none of which could buy a living. Jus thought he would just walk into an opportunity after working so hard for the last half a year. Instead, a future familiar abandonment ensued. 

A quiet summer arrived with an incredible contrast to the last three. It was amazing to Jus how his life could be so different from year to year. A year ago, there was no gravity, and momentous chaos was everything. The previous summer, immense change, desolation, and a new life. Three years back, a significant course change. In the background, the whole time, something was happening. It was so far away that it could only be heard in the background. A storm was mounting in the east.

As the days grew hot but more uncertain, Jus formed an alliance with his would-be assassin. It was more of a bond than he had thought possible. It caused him to aim higher than ever before. It got him noticed, and opportunity finally came. It had been almost a whole year since Jus was firmly employed. The nebulous air of his future also seemed prevalent in his balance with Maarja. It did not interlock as he thought it would. The distraction of new work proved beneficial when it came to avoiding close examination. 

As the dog days lumbered along, Jus and Maarja traded in their cul-de-sac friends for a down-on-his-luck med student sentenced to indentured servitude in a land where the sun never set in the summer and never rose in the winter. It was a friendship that Jus would hold onto forever. As this happened, a shot rang out from the east. Like thunderclouds building, eventually releasing their anger upon the land, this one had been building for a decade, escalating three years prior. Band-Aids were placed upon the cracks, but the damage was far too deep. Now, fire, gunpowder, lead, and uranium were the only remedies, and of course, blood.

Photo by Peter Schulz on Unsplash

Like an impression of a figure burned into the ground by an atomic flash, an image of Jus' presence is burned into the floor of that colonial house that no longer sits by the toll bridge on the barrier river. He will never be able to escape it; it will either have engraved him permanently or taken something he can never get back.

When Jus heard the news from the east, there was something different about it. He knew on day three, his life was about to change forever, very personally. In some ways, he had seen this coming his whole life. A recurring nightmare that was more of an abduction. It was a million miles away, but in a strange way he was sure that he was already overtaken.

I Am Good

 Sometimes I forget what I have. The clock spins and the calendar pages turn yellow, and I climb aboard that bully expecting a return on investment, only to realize I did not invest. Therein lies the deception. There are letters and there are words; they are the same, yet they can never truly be the same.

I see all the good around me that has been there all along, and it makes me angry because for all the times I couldn't see it or had taken it for granted, I suddenly realize it must have taken a great deal of effort to make that happen. I do not wish to have someone tampering with my perceptions, with such precision.

When my footing has slipped on the spiral staircase and I am losing my balance, I want to climb out of my own head because there are no solutions. Even then, it can be hard to identify that I have taken on the task of my own understanding. 

The human tendency to repeat former mistakes can be maddening. But as I swing back to the other side of the gorge on the rope, I notice it is a bit higher each time. A terrible way to assimilate wisdom, if you ask me, but progress nonetheless. 

When there is light, I see what I am responsible for. It is a rock climb, of which I must pay attention to every hold, step, and change. Reflecting on what I am taking in as I assess my course up the mountain, I must align my thinking with the success of my climb.

Photo by Salomé Guruli on Unsplash

In essence, I am leaving the parts of myself behind below. They are not to be missed. They represent my doubts, procrastination, and lack of determination. They mean nothing, and they have only held me back. It is only in taking these climbing steps that I can shed those who never wanted me to aspire to anything else. 

I am good, and only if I am climbing, and wanting to know more, to give more and to be more.