Escape

TODAY:

 

I need an escape.

I need to get away.

Far far away from everyone and everything.

I stand on two legs and I’ve placed the world on my shoulders.

But now up is down and left is right,

forwards is backwards and I just want to

shut my eyes

and block it all out.

Squeeze them tightly and not let anything in,

not even a tiny little sliver of light,

until it all goes away.

 

IT.

 

What is it?

What is it, really?

 

What do I want to run away from?

 

Life? 

A nebulous concept of a long list of items conveniently over-generalized

into the single word, “life”?

Life, which is supposed to be celebrated and, well, lived?

The opposite of which is, well, death?  And dying?

No, I don’t want to run away from life.

 

So, what then?  What is it?

Work?  Problems?  People?  Stress?  Trials and tribulations?

Bills?  Fears?  Bad memories? 

Of course I want to escape that. 

But are “those” “it”? 

They’ve always been around.

 

Well, I’m gonna try it away.

I’m gonna escape.

Run away.  Leaving today.

Hitting the road and leaving “it” all behind.

As soon as the night falls

(the darkness has already fallen)

I’m going to slip away in the shadows…

Yep…that’s the plan…

(Night falls.  I leave.)

Bye!  (said silently)

 

TOMORROW:

 

I’m still here.

I left, but I’m still here.

The sun has risen but I’m still in darkness.

What happened? 

I did leave “it” all behind.

 

Hmm.  Did I?

 

Maybe I had the wrong “it”.

So…what is “it”, really?

What have I done wrong?

What haven’t I done right?

Why am I clouded by the dark clouds overhead?

Why are they here?

 

Maybe I didn’t run far enough away.

Maybe I didn’t really escape.

Gotta try harder.

 

Not waiting for sunset this time.

I’m gonna work harder and try harder

to REALLY escape this time.

ESCAPE!

Maybe if I scream everyone will take me seriously

(although since I escaped yesterday,

I was alone

so no one heard me.)

 

(Night falls again.  Then the sun rises.

Then nights and days blend together into a massive blur of

nebulous, wasted time)

 

7 DAYS LATER:

 

I’m soooo tired.

All this escaping has me worn out

It’s like I need an escape from my escapes.

It’s been a parade of escapes…an escapade.

And there’s nothing left.

Nothing but me.

Everywhere I look and everywhere I turn

There’s just me,

Surrounded by nothing.

 

Exhausted, out of breath, out of life,

What is wrong with me?

 

What is wrong with me?

 

What is wrong with me?

 

(silence)

 

(more silence)

(deafening silence)

(the silence is SO LOUD I CAN BARELY HEAR WHAT IT’S SAYING)

 

WHAT?

 

WHAT?????

 

NOTHING?

 

NOTHING IS WRONG WITH ME????

 

Hmmmm.

 

(the sun rises)

 

THE NEXT DAY:

Maybe there isn’t anything wrong with me.

Maybe I haven’t done anything wrong.

Maybe I don’t need an escape.

Maybe I need to face it all.

Me.  The full me. 

Open my eyes.

 

“It” didn’t go away.

I went away.

And I didn’t solve “it” by going away.

Although going away made me realize “it” was “I”.

And that there was nothing wrong with “it” and/or “I”.

And if there’s nothing wrong with “it” and/or “I”,

Then I just have to learn to deal with “it” and/or “I”.

 

For “it” isn’t going away.  And neither am “I”.

I’m here for as long as I’m supposed to be.

And I’m not going to look for an escape.

 

And up is up again.

And forwards is forwards again.

And I’m going to try to live life.  The clear, correctly-simplified definition of the word “life.” 

Which is supposed to be celebrated, and, well, lived.

 

LIFE.  To live.

Exile

It was just another day of exile on the beach

A self-imposed exile

At least it started out that way

But in his mind, it has turned into a quicksand-ish struggle of mind over emotion

Or emotion over mind

Or…

Yep, that’s where he was stuck.

The days and nights flew by and blurred together until the sun and the moon,

and the clouds and the rains and the northern lights all fought each other

to gain control of the skies, the heavens, the horizon.

And he sat there, looking at it all

But not really looking

Just kinda staring off in the distance

Each wave of water disappearing into the next until

the turbulent seas appeared as calm and flat and smooth as glass;

A permanent shrug of the shoulders.

And the confusing thing,

he thought to himself,

is that he didn’t feel hopeless.

Just not hopeful.

“Where does that leave me, then?” his mind said silently.

The wind started to gently blow and the leaves in the trees started rustling.

Then the trees started swaying back and forth the way trees do when confronted by wind

Bending, and bending, and bending some more. 

The forest shudders with each ever-increasing wind gust

The man felt a cold shiver run down his spine, and his sense of fear started to…

…wait a minute…when did the beach become a forest?

And he sat there, looking at it all

But not really looking

Just kinda staring off in the distance
not really seeing the forest through the trees;

A permanent rolling of the eyes

The days and nights flew by and blurred together until the sun and the moon,

and the clouds and the rains and the leaves and branches all fought each other
to gain control of the heavens, the skies, the horizon.

He didn’t even know how long ago that first day was

And couldn’t really figure it out, either.

Never mind the fact that what was once a beach

somehow became a forest

A forest where the tree branches

reached up and poked holes in the sky,

And down came the rains,

Pouring, pouring,

Drowning him

And he sat there, drenched

Water dripping off his eyelids

Blurring his vision,

Not able to stare anything

And eventually he had to close his eyes

Close his eyes to the rains

Close his eyes to the confusion

Close his eyes to the wind and the sand and to his exile

His self-imposed exile...

…that now sat in a self-imposed darkness.

Blind to everything

Unable to see

Unable to feel

Unable to scream

Unable to…

think.

think.

think.

I’ve been here before

(he thought)

(yes, he started thinking

in the absence of all

in the blindness,

there was not an absence of thought

therefore there was not an absence of all

therefore there wasn’t nothing

there was something

he was not alone

he was not in darkness

he was not in exile

he could open his eyes

he did open his eyes.

And he could see.

It was foggy.

He was on a beach.

At the edge of a forest.

After a rainstorm.

On the next day...

The Winter Storm

I had a long trip ahead of me.

It was night, and the moon was high and bright in the sky,

shining my way ahead.

I was on a highway in the middle of nowhere,

I suppose I was headed somewhere,

but at that particular moment I didn’t care.

I was following the lines,

staying within the lines,

rolling along. 

The night skies began to darken,

as heavy ominous clouds poured in from my left.

They blocked the light from the moon,

and the stars,

and descended upon the earth,

smothering everything with their threatening shapes.

Then fell a snowflake,

a single snowflake,

and landed gently on my windshield.

Peacefully.  Quletly.

And then it melted away.

Then a second snowflake fell, and a third, and another,

and another and another two three five until I lost count.

At first gently falling,

but soon they started falling at a faster rate,

and I had to turn on my windshield wipers.

Then the winds started blowing.

At first there was a gust,

then a second one,

but soon enough the winds started

to howl and scream and

scatter everything in its path,

snowflakes and twigs and ice pellets,

throwing everything up in the air

tossing it around,

all the while screaming at the top of its lungs.

And soon I noticed that the lines I was following,

the lines I was staying within,

were no longer there.

Gone.

hidden under a blanket of those once-innocent snowflakes,

which had joined together to cover everything under it’s blanket.

I turned my windshield wipers on high.

Swish swish swish swish swish

back and forth and back and forth,

furiously fast but not keeping up.

I was blinded.

Blinded in a dark shade of white.

The wind screaming in my ear

(SCREAMING!!!)

Ice pellets were attacking my car,

like hundreds of bullets, non-stop,

endlessly,

no lines to follow

(was I even still on a road)

(where am I?  and where am I headed?)

And then I lost control

(literally and figuratively)

I gripped the steering wheel

tighter than I could ever remember gripping anything before

tighter and tighter until my knuckles were as white as

the blanket of snow that covered everything

and blinded me.

I was blinded.

I couldn’t see.

I couldn’t hear.

The wind was screaming.

(And was I screaming as well?)

The snow was blowing in all directions.

I was sliding in all directions.

The clouds were getting lower.

The snow was getting higher.

The sky was getting darker.

The snow was getting brighter.

Was I losing my mind?

I was already losing control.

And then…

…everything came to a stop.

My car.

The snow.

The wind.

I turned off my windshield wipers.

I turned off my car. 

There I stood.  In complete silence.

Eerie silence.

It seemed as if the whole world had come to a stop.

There were no sounds at all.

The blanket of snow covered everything,

and muted everything,

in a strange and odd sense of peace.

The clouds rolled away.

The moon came back out,

it’s light reflecting off of the newly fallen blanket.

And I stood there.  In complete silence.

Peaceful silence.

And then fell a snowflake,

a single snowflake,

and landed gently on my shoulder.

Peacefully.  Quletly.

And then it melted away.

Peacefully.