Le crique

The phone rings and you pick up with uncertain hello. This was the beginning of one of the most memorable days of my life.

I got in my car, tickets in hand, on a cold, blustery day. Opening my car door to a smell all but forgotten. At this point my car still smelled new. A sweet smell of leather accompanied me on my drive from work to your parents house. While driving I kept looking at the 10th row seats emblazoned with bright yellow type on a deep azure background. The apprehension building up to seeing you again was so thick you could have cut the air.

I watched you clumsily approach my car and the situation with the unapparent grace that only you could have had. Once in, all I saw was your smile. Awkward conversation as if new to our tongues is all that I remembered following the drive to a magical place. You told me I looked nice and I felt helpless. Once parked we set foot into a somber november sky. A short trek down a winding path, the boulevard scattered withe fallen leaves as red as fire. Providing the perfect backdrop for the colors of your beautiful dress and blue eyes. The sky was the model for what I now consider a gloomy day.

A large white tent stood as something almost foreboding on the horizon. As our hands brushed each other causing you to look right in my eyes. This is how you would say it is ok. We passed through a makeshift barricade, handed our tickets to a man in a masquerade mask, exchanged a childish sense of excitement and you kissed me. I remember the sound of our shoes on the fault filled gravel pavement as if it were some sort of twisted metaphor.

At this moment I knew I would never forget a single detail of this for the rest of my entire life.

Walking into the tent shrouded in darkness fumbling to find our seats, this is world of imaginable opportunity. I couldn't believe how close we were. In so many ways. I could hear your heels stick to the sugar coated floor. The overwhelming shrill pitch of a whistle filled the air. A large, stalwart black man in a top hat sauntered on stage whistling songs never possible in my mind. The Spot light hit and for an hour I was transported to a place that only existed in my mind before I was too old to know it cant exist. I saw a tiny woman surrounded by giants, floating with the help of none but balloons. Balloons eventually fall or pop.

Intermission

It was dusk now and we wondered amongst the jugglers and vendors in amazement. The smell of carmel filled my nose as the sound of exotic guitar swam in my ears beside your voice. The lights danced around us at what in my opinion now seems like a feverish pitch. This is how memory works. Things speed up and slow down, taste sweeter, are warmer and more beautiful than reality. Yet this is reality. It is what was my reality. Bustling with visible energy in my eyes we made way back into the cave. Or was it a tent. Yes the tent. The cacophony of feet rhythmically hitting the floor brought my eyes from you to birds. Or men. Men in bird suits. The plumage was the color of mustard and I was alone in this show. This was my show to you. I am not the kind of person who is a companion to ghosts of your nature. Almost there, corporeal. Yet I held your hand as we oohed and ahhed. Our symphony of astonishment at how they did not drop the ball. The wire so thin and perilously suspended above us, yet not even a vibration of nerves was felt by me from them. But from me to them is another story in and of itself. This was the moment I lost my safety net and plummeted down. This was my fate sung so gracefully by the siren of my own design. Eyes on the prize. You miss so much what with sleeping and blinking. Time makes fools of all of us every day. The pace raced faster and faster till the lights dim as waning moons we fell under this spell. Only to be shuffled out like a head of cattle. To come to this plastic tarp and metal flooring shabbily built to host my hopes and dreams for a few night before giving other people false hope.

What is this hope, more importantly what is his reality. An illusion of magic is only an illusion when you realize it. Right? for the moments between sleep and awake we are real. No pre disposition to what we know will tell us that monsters dont exist and are not having coffee with us.