Home <>----<> Photography <>----<> Muffins <>----<> Poetry, Prose & Politics <>----<> Purchase from On The Fly
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Being high school boys, and being mostly clueless about everything regarding the female of the species, we devoted enormous amounts of time to figuring out how to be close to Valerie. I managed a big score when I arranged to sit next to her in biology class, or perhaps it was chemistry, the waters of time wash my memory causing the unimportant details to weather away. An even bigger score was when I played “footsie” with her in that same forgotten class. Finally, my biggest and most courageous score of all was when I grabbed her butt in front of half of the school, and lived to tell about it. Yes, receiving her attention was like a dream come true, for any of us, and we all enjoyed basking in the glory.
The year was 1990 and we had our five year class reunion. Ronald and I were pretty wary of the whole concept. After all, we didn’t like these people when we went to school with them. It was unlikely we were going to like them now. None the less, we decided to make an appearance if for no other reason than to laugh at the “hillbilly rednecks”.
At the reunion we found exactly what we expected, a bunch of drunk people with whom we had nothing in common. But Valerie had degenerated further than anticipated. Our former dream girl was now unappealing shaped. She had gained considerable weight, and didn’t appear to have seen exercise in years. The face which five years ago rivalled Helen of Troy now couldn’t launch a paper boat, much less a ship. Like the rest of them, she was drunk, falling about herself and sounding like an idiot.
Valerie invited Ronald or I to sit next to her. I deferred to Ronald, he deferred to me. It was almost like a comedy routine, only is was solidly serious. “Ronald, you sit next to her.”
“No Adrian, you go ahead.”
“No, really, you sit next to her.”
“You sit with her, my wife would be upset.”
“Your wife will never know. Val always liked you better, you sit next to her.”
This continued until her drunken attention span lost sight of us and locked in on another target. Did Valerie change, or did we? Whichever it was, Ronald and I made our escape and walked out on the class on 1985 forever. We never went back. We could only go forward.
We quickly learned to tolerate each other’s presence. Living with forty people in an open barracks you find ways to get along. We ignored each others bad habits. We lived through each other’s music, even the things we would have never tolerated back on the block. After the very trying moments, such as two week field deployments, we would have barracks parties. There would be loads of beer and the one musical artist we could all agree on, Hank Williams Jr. A man whom you would think, based on many of his songs, was in the infantry at some point.
After the first year we knew more about each other than we knew about our parents and siblings. In the dark of the night I would hear the door open, the sound of feet on the floor, and know who it was by the footsteps. We spotted each other money without hesitation. We lied for each other. A man strong in one area helped everyone else who was weak in that area, and they shored up his weaknesses in return.
Everyone wants that, to be part of something great and good. Corporations hold team-building exercises under the assumption they can create this type of environment (fall backwards and let your co-worker catch you). The companies composed of Generation Xers (those who: consider themselves young geniuses, drive SUVs, wear their stupid “no fear” shirts, and snowboard every weekend because it’s “cool”) believe they have it. Every little click of teenagers and college kids think they are the tightest group in the world. They are all fooling themselves. I learned many important things in the military, among them: Where there is no chance of death, there is no chance of life. The greater the risk the greater the reward.
But that chance of death is gone for most of my unit. Some of the unit stayed in beyond the three years we signed for, most of us went back to the civilian world. Those who remained in the service split up and went their separate ways. We lost our proximity to each other, and with it our friendship. We lost our chance for death, and with it we lost our chance for life. Now we can’t go back, we can only go forward.
Then I left for two years. Another city, another state, another life. I went back to the theatre group a number of times in the first year. Then I spent sixteen months away from those people. When I finally returned, they had evolved beyond my recognition. Some of the elements were the same, but the gestalt was a whole new being from the one I had been part of. My place had changed as well -- I was no longer a necessity as I had once been. In fact, I had been “upgraded” to legend status.
The show was still going on, but I no longer had a place in the production. I could not go back, I could only go forward.
The Place was far enough from the surrounding cities that the light did not block out the stars. People who don’t get out of the city limits don’t really know what the stars look like. How many there are, how beautiful they are, how deep and rich the night is. Fires in the sky, so distant that we see them as timeless points on an endless plain of deep dark blue.
When we played music it was loud. No one was close enough to hear it. We screamed, we sang, we even blew things up now and then. The Place was our bomb shelter.
When we shut up, which we seldom did back in the early 80s, it was silent. Silence like only nature can create. The Place was an open field, only one tree. It’s silhouette the only thing which broke up the line of the horizon. Under a full moon the illumination was amazing. I could see so well it appeared to be day, and through the silence I could hear just as clearly. The wind, the insects, the rustle of grass. When the moon was dark, the sky was a pallet of stars. The Milky Way stretched like a band of silver from horizon to horizon. I would lie on the hood of the car, looking into the heavens. It was so quiet I could hear the noise of my thoughts bouncing around in my head.
I haven’t been to The Place in years. The last time I was there was in 1994. I was back in Texas on business. I drove out in a rental car and parked in the same spot. Nothing had changed, as far as I could tell. I put Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut in the tape deck. Lying down on the hood of the car I looked at those same stars. The same stars that shined on me in 1985. The music was the same music I listened to in 1985. The wind was the same as I felt in 1985. The night was the same as the night of 1985. The cigar I smoked was the same. The Boones Farm Strawberry Hill wine I drank was the same. The only thing that was different was me. It was the closest I’ve ever
come to going back, but I knew I could only go forward.
In the sky was a dot which soon grew into a Huey helicopter. At first we paid scant attention as it approached. The larger it grew, the more we realised something was wrong. The Huey advanced, heading for a neighbouring mountain side. We waited for the pilot to pull up and make a course correction, but that moment was lost somewhere in time. As the Huey impacted into the side of the mountain we could only watch. It would have taken us hours to reach the crash site.
I radioed the situation to higher and a medivack was dispatched. Later that day we would receive word that three air crew and six infantry were dead, no survivors. We couldn’t go back, we could only go forward. The nine soldiers aboard that bird couldn’t go back either, they could only go forward. No one ever goes back down the path of life, they only go forward. Forward into Shakespeare’s great undiscovered country.
Contact Page