More writing by Bruce Taylor
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On The Trail
You are walking that trail beneath that sky so strange, the stars exploding red and yellow and blue. You continue on and you round a rocky cliff face--and there she stands--seemingly frozen in movement. It is almost as if she is dead, but that isn't really the way it is--you see her as she was ten or fifteen years ago and you are that amount of time ahead of her. She was your girlfriend but that was a long, long time ago. Because you are in different times, you move at different speeds. You do not know why this is so. It is just the way it is in this part of the universe. You remove your backpack, take out some licorice, and look at her--Lisa. She is just as slender and tall as you remember her all those years ago. Her hair is jaw length, her lips slightly parted and one leg is up as if to take a step and her head is turned to the left as if she's gazing upon something absolutely mesmerizing. And of course, since she is still the way she was fifteen years ago, she hasn't changed. You see her move imperceptibly down the trail; to you, she moves slowly; to her, you move so fast that you cannot be seen. But that's what happens when lots of time passes and you are in very different places, spatially, time-wise and every thing else-wise. You study her; overhead, a comet slashes across the heavens, and bathes everything in a momentary white glow. Things are strange in this part of the cosmos. You were warned by the Police of Unresolved issues that if you came here, this is what you would find--as well as finding her. So you sit on a blocky chunk of granite and you ponder Lisa. You let out a sigh. "You know," you say to her, knowing that she can't hear you, at least not obviously, "it really was a good relationship. It really, really was, and I still have great feelings of love and affection for you. I wish it would have worked."
You stare off into the distance and your attention is drawn to a mountaintop some dozen miles away; you watch a puff of smoke issue from it, slowly roiling to the sky. You muse, a volcanic eruption. You were told about this too---forces may be unleashed when you deal with emotional issues and who knows how they will manifest themselves. You watch the smoke as it slowly blossoms upward. You turn to look at Lisa again and she has moved closer, but her head is still turned away from you.
You chew another piece of licorice. "I wish it would have worked." You pause as something bird shaped swoops and flutters by. You have no idea what it is. You continue. "But it just wasn't working--there was a lot we should have talked about before we got married--no, money was never an issue for me because I came from a background where relationships were important, not money. You came from a background of no money and no relationships and I guess no trust and I can see why money meant so much to you--"
You pause, choosing your words carefully. Discussions like this never went well. What if she can hear you? You've practiced how you were going to say it--maybe you can say what you need to say without her getting defensive and without you giving up. A star explodes not too far way and you can feel a shy warmth--that or radiation? You wonder. Oh, well, so my DNA gets a little fried. We were warned about this, too. But it's ok. It's worth it to meet your old lover, partner on the trail, to say this to her. You wish you could say it to her in person, but in all your searching, you never found her until you came here, to this place and this is the way it has to be--better than nothing--the fact that she's here, on this trail, means she's still alive, some place, somewhere, and you wonder, what would happen if you really did meet her in person? Would you be brave enough to say these things to her and say it right this time so you two could actually communicate without it falling apart all over again? And you feel this horrible, gut-wrenching pang of regret. God, how you wish you would have--could have--told her way back then, but you didn't know, you didn't have the words--you were, as you look back all those years--you sigh as the right word comes to mind, inept--at many things but most of all, communication. And you know it to be so ironic that given the family you came from, you'd have this problem and you still can't fathom why except that just maybe your background wasn't really all that healthy after all. "But still," you say, looking at her, "I really did my best, but even when I worked sixty hours a week and gave up what I really loved to do--I gave up a lot for you and still it wasn't enough and no amount of money was enough and then I began to feel not enough and felt I was giving up my life to you--what could I do?"
You watch the volcano erupting in the distance, its huge cauliflower shaped mass of smoke slowly curling, moving up into the sky--it's moving faster than Lisa, slower than you--you have hours before it gets here and by that time, you'll be gone, over the ridge, to find someone else to whom to make amends and you know what this journey is about. You look at your licorice, take another bite and say, "The journey of life is a journey though joy, sorrow, amends, self-forgiveness, forgiveness of others and compassion--above all, compassion towards ourselves and realizing that--" you stop and the sudden stab of pain, of sadness tears at you, "--that just because people love each other, doesn't always mean it can work. But the important thing is that people do and try to love."
In the blue-black sky overhead, more stars nova and you study the rainbow hues of shattering stars--the reds, yellows, blues, purples and sometimes the light is bright enough to cast pale shadows around you. But in this strange part of space, where the laws of physics are not laws, but preferences, no matter what happens, you're safe, as is Lisa. You look at Lisa and you want so much just to touch her, to hold her but you signed a paper that you would not touch and you know you are being watched by the Issues Police who will Freeze Dart you in a second if it looks like you are even contemplating touching someone in a different time. You cannot do that, "You don't know the ramifications," the Police said before letting you enter the portal to The Trail. "You don't know what that could do, how far the ripples might go--the bomb exploding in The Enola Gay and not over Hiroshima or Hitler somehow winning the war." It's brutal not to touch and hold someone close to you and say, "I'm sorry," but, you realize, you don't even know what the experience would be to touch her--she might vanish, you might disappear and the Universe might somehow, because of that action, turn in on itself and may not have ever been born. Just being here causes disturbance enough but here, it can be handled. You watch the volcano explode: suddenly the entire mountain seems to slowly shatter, to melt in a gigantic explosion. Even so, just given the difference in times, you know you're safe. You ponder Lisa. She has moved a centimeter closer to you, her head turned a bit more toward you, her lips turning up into a slight smile like she likes what she sees and maybe, on some level, what she hears? Another comet slashes overhead and its closeness and incandescent brilliance momentarily blind you. You look to the volcano and you guess that the blast could get this far, but you'll soon be far away, and it isn't happening in Lisa's Time--she's on the trail fifteen years ago, in a different time, different place and you are, in some strange way, ghosts passing and one being aware of the passing, the other not. You know she'll be safe. You stand. "I guess that's all I got to say," you sigh. "Just know I still love you and wish it would have worked--above all, I hope where ever you are, I hope you are happy." You sling the pack over your shoulder, look at her and, still loving her, you move on, feeling grief but feeling released; you let the tears flow as you walk that trail to the ridge top under that strange, lovely and haunting sky.
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