The path out of the woods

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.

So I took a U-turn.

It was not really about going back per se. Just... sideways. Out of the woods, for one thing. I had been down this path before, I knew every wicked twist and turn, and I just not had it in me to impair my luck any further. Down the same old way, with the same old perils staring blankly into my face. I shivered a tad while my feet quietly felt out the ground, looking for the way.

The earth was wet and the path winding and treacherous, as they are usually said to be. Muddy, slippery, yet rocky as well. As sure as hell you would get hurt by slipping, as it is. I knew it, however, and I could almost take those steps with my eyes closed. I only needed to hear the leaves crushing under my weight, feel the wind in my back, take in that wet stench of the darkness. And get the next step in. I knew what it would mean to make a break from that place, to leave behind the weeds and the brushwood, the hollows in the trees, the ghostly rattles of the nightly creatures. I knew how to find my way back because I had already done it. And yet... I had somehow managed to, yet again, go astray.

There is something overwhelmingly gratifying about re-enacting one’s mistakes. A sick pleasure, perhaps? No, I dissent. There is something much deeper and psychologically darker. So much more so than a dark wood itself. It’s almost a playful exercise for the psyche, one that many a good therapist would most likely entice us to. What if I find myself in the same situation? Would I do the same thing? Would I turn here or there, would I fall down that identical rabbit hole? (or dark wood, as things are). Am I incapable of change? Or I could perhaps turn more metaphysical and argue that it may only be I still have something I must understand? So, in conclusion, I should hurt my foot again, to learn what it is that I missed when I limped home the last time.

She was fair as the first lights of spring would have her, when they come to ease the pain of winter. I could picture her without exerting any effort, while I walked ‘back’ my dark path. She was pale, yet graceful and bright, and that ‘twist’ of a smile would send my heart bursting in a million pieces. I did not even have to look at her. The way she walked was so imprinted in my memory, I would just need but a sideways glance to feel her presence, to know it was her and not anybody else in the entire world who was right beside me.

For all the clarity of her vision, now I was alone. But I was starting to see the clearing taking shape, the way out of the muddy, stinky path. I could already see the lights of the paved road dazzling before me. My feet were feeling suddenly less heavy and the earth less wet. The rattles were steadily turning into song, the ghostly creatures into flashy, beautiful birds. The trees were fewer and whole, their roots sturdy and their branches vibrant, cutting gracious silhouettes against the night sky and the road lights. Even though it was still dark, I could clearly see the leaves, flowing with life through their veins. The path was clear, as if any weeds had been torn out with gracious force. As if they had never been there.  

Her glowing image was fully formed in my mind now.

But then the smile twitched. And not in that beautiful way it sometimes did. The pain overtook her face like a shadow.

I could have just stepped back and pulled her to safety, you know. I could have just stepped in front of her, otherwise. I could have also just not told her we needed to rush out of the restaurant, because our little escapade was over, because of whatever ridiculous appointment I had to be at. Well, these things are so important… until they are not. I could have also been just on the side of the road, like a true gentleman would, or even... I might have had some menial degree of lucidity to push her out of the way.

A few of those multiple, endless Ifs that would never come to be.

But the red fuming car, it came. In one, two, three seconds, it gashed all of our little stupid dreams, out of the way. That roaring velvety machine with the devil inside… I still clench my teeth at its sound. I could swear, if anyone believed me, that every single time that sound plays its way through my mind, something breaks again.

And then there is silence. It’s an odd kind of sound, really. If there was any way I could describe it… let’s just say, there is nothing natural about it. It is, in fact, more like the ‘black hole’ of all silences. As if no sound could exist next to it. As if nothing could exist with it. Especially not life.

The hole of silence does not last, however. Another sound swiftly makes its way through the vacuum. And a vacuum no longer is. I remain puzzled for a few moments, while I try to make sense of where it’s coming from. There’s some familiarity to it that makes me feel strange. Have I heard this before, perhaps? And then there’s ghostly rattling, and a breezy brushing of dead leaves. The darkness gets thicker and thicker. Oh I see. I looked down at my feet, and despite them being enveloped in shadows, I could definitely see. My feet were wet, again. And I could no longer tell where the paved road was, or where the lights had gone off to.

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost. Oh God be damned! I was all the way in, back again.

If only there was something I could have learned by now…