It was early Saturday morning in Mid May. Joy was out Yard Saleing, and I was on the trail to breakfast. And I mean trail literally, because I was walking the Mill Creek trail, and longing for a Mexicali omelet at Mr. Ed’s. Don’t think horse. In fact, a giraffe statue stands out front. It is a great breakfast place, and Mr. Ed is simply Ed. For May it was cold, 45 degrees. But there were people and animals about on the trail. I passed an older gentleman wearing shorts with a wide brimmed hat pulled down snuggly over his eyes. He seemed warm enough, and was chugging along concentrating on making rewarding progress. A short red haired youngish women jogged by, pulled by a large hyper poodle. She seemed not young enough, and resigned. Everything seemed almost too normal. In fact, most days that change your life forever tend to start out just this way. In a split second, the temperature dropped 15 degrees, and the sun seemed to suffer from a spell of the vapors, because it was as if it was just rising. And the air had taken on a kind of aggressive physicality. Nitrogen and Oxygen were saying, we’re not nothing. We are matter, take notice. And Argon molecules were screeching, “Me too! Me too!” And the earth, herself, was grabbing hold of my feet, saying “From me you came, from me you shall return.”
I heard nothing. No animals or people or cars on Issacs Avenue or Tausick Way. Had I suddenly gone deaf! I snapped my fingers close to my right ear, and no, I still had the sense of hearing. Thanks be to the Argon molecules! I was becoming more than mildly concerned, to put it mildly. It took my utmost effort to make any progress, but I had to make it to Mr. Eds, and to people. As I finally approached Tausick Way, the sky had lightened, but not really. It was as if a giant slab of concrete had been plopped down upon the unaware hamlet of Walla Walla. These were not clouds, but a giant concrete mixer spewing gray. As I turned left on Tausick, I wondered will this end, is it some waking dream? I wanted to run, but that was out of the question. As I fought my way to Issacs, I had no hesitation on crossing the street against the light, because there were no cars. None. And it was Saturday, not Sunday! Somehow with a force of will I thought beyond me, I crossed Isaacs. If a car had appeared, it would have been as shocking as seeing a purple Tyrannosaurus Rex in a tutu, dancing towards me.
I lost track of time. If time had any meaning here? I only recall struggle, grayness, and sameness. But finally, as if some mirage rising out of the desert of deprivation, I beheld the Mr. Ed’s sign. It beckoned me. I gained energy, if not speed. As I struggled nearer, I could make out light within. There were two things strange about the light: it was nearing 9:00 AM and there should be no need for lights, and it was not so much a light as a glow. But I could see people moving around inside and that buoyed me. But as I came closer there was something about the movement of the people that disturbed me. It didn’t ring true. It was as if they were animatronic puppets. Like a ride at Disney World. I suddenly didn’t want to come any closer, but what choice had I. As I came round the front of Mr. Eds, and peered in. The people moving seemed on a track and the ones not seemed on a pivot. I fought my way to the main entrance, by the covered parking area. I dreaded opening the door, but what could I do. Go back, to what and where? So I latched on to the door handle, as if to a repugnant life preserver, pulled it open, and lurched inside.
And them POW! An explosion of warmth, light, energy, the smell of good food, and the delightful chaotic sound of people. It was Mr. Ed’s! I was back among the living. I didn’t know whether to shout for joy or to faint dead away. I did neither. The doubly energized waitress said, “Sit Anywhere! But not on anyone you don’t know very well.” And I was more than delighted to do just that. I made my way to an empty spot by the Isaacs Street window, because I didn’t know anyone there quite that well. For a time I thought everything was back to normal. I ordered my Mexicali omelet, but this time a four egg one with potato cakes, and an English muffin. I also asked for some Red Tabasco sauce. I was living on the wild side. And then I saw her, and I knew that it wasn’t over yet.
And I say her reservedly. The first presence I noticed was not even anything mammalian. It was not even biological. It was more a spot of blackness emerging from across Isaacs Avenue. No, not blackness, but perhaps the absence of light, a kind of ultimate darkness. As this darkness neared it slowly morphed into the shape of a tall, striking women in a flowing dark gown. At first the gown was midnight black, then old fashioned chalk board black, then stormy blue, then falling with rain into muddy brown, and finally coalescing into a rich, fertile earth brown. I smiled, relieved, thinking of an Earth mother blessing the crops, but then my smile whithered on the vine. Because I had noticed something strange about the way she walked, about how her feet kissed the earth and rose, sighed, kissed the earth, rose, sighed . . . No, that wasn’t quite it. It wasn’t so much the earth, but the law of gravity. She romanced gravity, and gravity was smitten. So not Earth Mother but of the earth of matter: a geophysical, cosmological manifestation, an incarnation. Of Dark Matter perhaps, something dating back to the Big Bang itself. One who walks heavy upon the earth.
Then a flash of emerald green. Her eyes? It couldn’t be; but it was, because at that moment her gaze pierced me and instantly I was chilled to the bone. I expected to see my breath in the air before me. Within those emerald eyes there pooled all there was to know of me, and I was found what? I feared to know. Then she strode on toward the back entrance with the walk of a woman who knew how attractive she was but didn’t care, and yet didn’t mind if you looked. Should I leave, hide, crawl into a hole? And what if she never came in at all? What if I had simply imagined her or she had been a hallucination? But I needn’t have feared for there she was talking to the waitress. Her hair was long, straight and black. And there were the eyes. How could I see her eyes when she wasn’t even looking my way? But I knew she knew exactly where I was. I thought it best that I finish my breakfast and leave. I couldn’t finish the omelet, and the coffee was just too dark to touch a drop. I did take quick glances her way, in the corner table. She ate with her back to me, and seemed to savor, no experience, every bite as if it were for the first and only time. But I knew I had to be gone. For the first time at Mr. Ed’s I couldn’t wait for the bill. I went up front and said I was ready to pay. After some consternation they produced my bill which was $11.75. I gave the woman a $20 and said, “Keep the change.” She gave me a look that said, OK, weird, but fine by me.
As I fast walked up Isaacs towards home, I knew there was no need to look back. Everything appeared back to normal. I could almost convince myself that it as all some dark dream, but I knew it wasn’t. If looked back then, what? No, it was best to get home as fast as possible, and I did. As I was walking up our front walk, I got a call from my wife, Joy, saying that she wouldn’t be home until after 10:00. She was at Hidden Treasures, a second hand women’s clothing store close to Macy’s, which used to be the Bon Marche. It’s still The Bon to me. Macy’s, who cares! As I unlocked our front door and entered, I knew something had changed. Something very close to me was not the same, and never would be. I thought it must be me, and rushed into the bathroom and closed the door, turned on the light, and examine myself in the mirror. There must be something noticeably different about me, like the beginning of a third eye or something. But I could see no change. I looked a little frazzled, but that was all. Then I heard our cat, Gabby, meowing outside the door. She hates closed doors. I opened it and she padded inside. She sat and looked up at me, with that look that cats have that says, ‘I can peer down into your very soul and read your every thought and am not be very impressed by any of them’. In the past, with these looks, I’ve almost expected her to speak. Not telepathically, or in in Cat, but to me in English. Well, this time she did. She said, “Sport, you’ve seen her haven’t you. The one who walks heavy upon the Earth.” Indeed I had. Sport?
And so it began.
Slow Dancing with Words 