What I Know Now – I Didn’t Know Then

ideas

I’ve been roaming this planet for a few years now, and I’m constantly amazed at how little I know.  In fact, my comprehension of ideas and events seems to be working backwards — like an intellectual Benjamin Button.  Stuff that I knew with all certainty to be true when I was a younger man has become – not so much.  Here are just a few examples of how dead wrong I was.

When I was a kid, I was certain that the best minds would always, eventually, rise to shed light on, and perhaps even vanquish, the dark forces of ignorance.  Welcome to 2020, boys and girls, when the leader of the Free World is going to be either Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders or – holy crap! – Joe Biden.

As a young person, I believed information and education were the keys to solving the world’s problems.   Not even close!  Here we are, the most educated population in history, with all the information in the universe available to us at the click of a mouse, and what are we doing?  Playing “Fortnite” and binge-watching The Walking Dead.  I rest my case.

I used to think that popular democracy was a good thing.  ‘Fraid not!  I have one word for you – Twitter.

At one time, I believed that intelligence was a sliding scale.  It was my assumption that all people were relatively smart, depending on how you looked at it.  Nope!  The world is full of evidence that stupid is real, it’s everywhere and, in some cases, it’s thick enough to cut with a knife.  Plus, it’s contagious.  Hang out with stupid people long enough and you’ll end up buying outrageous amounts of toilet paper because – uh – a bunch of other people are buying it?  (Too soon?)

And finally:

At one time, I thought the truth was an absolute.  Actually, the truth is a moveable feast, and thank God for that, because there are certain times when I want to be lied to.  For example, I don’t want to know how many nuclear weapons have been lost since 1945.  Just tell me none and I’ll be fine with that.  Nor do I want to know how close we are to economic disaster, why climate change can’t be reversed or what kind of bums and noses are in my hotdog.  The fact is, in some cases, the truth will not set you free — it’ll just totally stress you out.

Sylvia And The Water

sylvia water

Nothing prepares you for the quantity of love.  The words of the poets are only sips at the fountain, forever overflowing.  The songs of the minstrels cupfuls you might carry away.  And even the tales of happily ever after we tell are merely quenching moments.  For love is vast, beyond endless, and no one who slips into its waters can see its depths.

Sylvia Harrow had spent the lazy Wisconsin summer bathing in it like a pampered Eastern princess.  Lounging leg long, submerged to her shoulders in warm and wet, her head back in conscious sleep, lost in the languor of what could be their dreams.  And she would slide forward, slowly sinking, denying her instincts, letting the water touch her face, hold her hair, cover her mouth until she closed her eyes and willingly, wantonly allowed herself to drown.  And lying there full still, soundless, the water told her that she was the Venus he said she was.  She was the one fantasy she saw in the want of his eyes.  The moment of naked desire that only the two of them would ever know.  And he, flawed perfection, was the one enough she had ever wanted, the aching hunger she had glimpsed more than once but had never fully seen.  He was the never alone again, the warm regular breathing bed, the first touch and the last kiss goodnight.  And then she would raise her head like an emerging goddess and feel the wet run down her face, shake her heavy hair, point her painted toes and, mouth half-closed, gasp a breath as if it was the finish of the world.

Sylvia loved being loved and being overpowered by it, but she knew that, slowly upon slowly, the water would cool, the mirror glass surface murk with age, and the steamy mists fade on the breeze of years.  There was no naïve that could convince her otherwise.  But she also knew, deep in the forever sound of his idle laugh, the step she knew from far away and the single scent of him on the pillow, that this would be enough.  What she felt right now would be enough to fill their life with eternity and the waters that surrounded them would always reflect the stars, splash with the rain, freeze and thaw and sparkle in the brilliant sunrise sunshine.

 

Running

running

In the evening when the bright playground lights came on, it always felt like an alien landing field from a science fiction movie, and all the young men chasing and shouting were excited Earthlings, looking for First Contact.  They weren’t.  They were playing soccer – futbol – dreaming of Muller and Cruyff and Super Lig glory.  Sylvia Harrow didn’t understand the game, but it didn’t matter: she wasn’t playing.  She was running, one foot in front of the other, chasing the clock inside her head.  Circling the boys, over and over, like a jogging sentinel, on the long oval track that surrounded their field.

In the beginning, they’d taken an interest in the odd phenom of a woman running, shouting gestures and pantomimes for her perceived attention.  Once, early on, in a bold stroke of stupidity, one wannabe Romeo hopped the short chain link fence to run alongside her, feigning kisses.  Sylvia’s eyes never left the track and, in perfect rhythm, she shot the ball of her foot into his ankle and sent him face first into the unforgiving gravel.  He skidded and rolled and got to his feet, burning with his buddies’ laughter, not sure what to do with the fist-tight girl standing over him, ready for a fight.  Fortunately, his honour was saved when Mirac stepped between them and guided him back to his friends.  That’s where he explained that the woman called Sahin and her employer Karga were busy people who didn’t have time to visit idiots who ended up in hospitals.  From then on, the futbol players pointedly ignored the foolish lesbian, although several of them would remember her effortless stride and swinging ponytail later on in the night.

Sylvia didn’t care.  She was concentrating on her hips, fighting the natural feminine sway, cushioning the impact with her calves and trying to force her feet to align and drive her forward, not sideways.  These were the kinetics her school coach had taught her.  They were the magic combination that triggered her instincts to abandon all thought and just run.  Run, like some female animal built for the chase.  Pacing her prey, tireless, relentless, collecting tiny molecules of energy, gathering them in her pulsing, aching muscles, saving them for one final tearing rage of speed.  This was where her mind filled and emptied and filled again, sorting and discarding the practicals, the possibles, the problems, the stress.  Nothing escaped.  While she ran, no part of Sylvia’s life could hide in a dark corner, waiting to ambush her.  No emotional thread was too thin to untangle nor too big to reweave.  No vague thought was too small, grand plan too large and no passion, feeling or sensation could be conveniently forgotten.  This was where Sylvia forced honesty to reveal itself.  Here, there was no place for her to hide.

And the truth was, these two hours, whenever she could grab them, were the only ones Sylvia regularly allowed herself.  And when she ran, step after step, steady as a metronome, she understood, deep somewhere, that they were all she needed.  She knew she was a strong, female animal and even though she also knew she wasn’t actually built for the chase (No, she wasn’t a predator, not really.) she was also nobody’s prey.