An Unexpected Trip

2005-06-13
7:43 p.m.

My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,
So huge, so hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.

~Emily Dickinson

Anna�s entire trip to Florida was plagued with 100% humidity, hours of afternoon thunderstorms, and barely 78 degrees when the sun was out (usually early mornings when she was still in dreamland). She managed to avoid the hurricane, and arrived home to lower humidity and a daily high of 95 degrees predicted for the week. Ahh�.this home is like�..well, home!

When you grow up without air conditioning in a particularly hot and humid location your relationship with summer is complex and contradictory. You were told to go outside and play amid stories that sunlight is dangerous and burns the skin.

Memories of her youthful summers are accompanied by the theme song from the sun-scorched Western �A Fistful of Dollars�. The one with the haunting whistle. There�s no more appropriate soundtrack for the countless times when you would burst through the entrance doors of the public pool to reveal both the pool and the inconceivably hot stretch of concrete you had to cover to get to it. Once a tentative sole touched bare, hot concrete, you broke for it. Sure, some kids fell and were left behind. But you were elementary school-age. That was their parents� problem. You were in the water.

Not that summers in a small Midwestern town weren�t fun. She had a great time and has a long list of mosquito bite and poison ivy stories to prove it. There were hours spent lounging under the shade of the neighbor�s carport, or the boughs of the backyard willow tree. Too hot to ride bikes, play tennis, or form a sandlot baseball game the dog days of summer mostly included sitting around and talking. She has no idea what a dozen kids from 8 � 12 found to talk about, but talk they did for hours at a time. She has always wondered if some of those conversations contained the answers to solving the world�s problems, long forgotten upon entering the world of adulthood.

There are plenty of climatically wonderful places to be in the United States this time of year � places that make you feel good to be alive without having to seek out a shade tree around 3 pm. Unfortunately, she doesn�t live in any of them. And vacation�s over for another few weeks.

Of course sitting on her desk, taunting her, is that free roundtrip Southwest Air ticket that was in the mail when she got home. The one she fantasizes about. Where she races to the airport, and goes to Ben, invited or not. The scene plays out in her imagination. Waiting for him in the parking lot behind his apartment, she opens the car door and rises to her feet as he arrives. As he sees her, a surprised, shocked look appears on his face. She walks towards him, and, at that moment, it forces him to admit the truth, whatever the truth might be. A soap opera last ditch grand stand from the mournful soul of a haunted lover.

In her fantasies he takes her in his arms. In reality, it could be the final goodbye. Thirty years gone to the past. Thirty years of the future, should she live that long, to be without him. Where shall she go�.where shall she go.


And if it all falls apart, I will know deep in my heart, the only dream that mattered had come true. In this life, I was loved by you.

~Colin Raye

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