Remembrances

I'm thinking of writing about finding the love of my life... many years ago.... she's dead now but I still remember.

It's torture when someone you love leaves the planet... I mean, if she were here on Earth you still always have the chance to meet again and carry on as friends.... but not as before... I've changed, she probably has changed, circumstances have changed, and time & place have changed.... so... it's almost impossible to carry on in the best of circumstances...

sad really... it was a time to remember; a beautiful time.

It's like living a charmed life and when it's over, floating off to heaven, and once there, God says, "I never knew you"...

Some will actually experience that.  Talk about the king of disappointments...

Almost like a cute girl looking into your eyes and seeing all the love and admiration then finding out she was looking into the eyes of someone else,

and you say with the utmost strength, "I'm sorry... I did not realize you weren't looking at me"...You're sorry alright, but, not for that. 

He smiles, barely.....then turns, and crawls back to his seat

all alone....  once again

He hates that place.... fiercely

but ..after so long of a time there.... he's used to it at least

Not much of a consolation because the pain cutting into him is too much to just throw it off to the side.

Its been grudgingly born and carried for a long time now

But, it all changed on a night long ago... March 11, 1973. Spring break where I lived. At that time, I worked at the New Smyrna Beach Water Recycling Plant. I simply called it the water plant. After reading of lesbians in the paperback books left in the drawers by the old men that worked there, or sat there long enough to call it work. It was time for one final round of checking the huge water tanks to see if the recycling had been either started or finished on time and if the pressure in the pumps that pumped the water out to the community was where it should be. It was. The time was getting close to 9 o'clock in the evening. It was no different than a hundred other nights getting off work. I was in twelfth grade then. Baseball hero in the class of 1973. A lot happened in a few short final months of high school. I would graduate that May, I was finishing up the current baseball season, spring break was in full bloom, and on that most ordinary of nights, I would meet Karen, the girl who ended up being the love of my life. Although, I was not aware of that and wouldn't be for another five days. I found out later, that Karen was in Florida with her mom and her 12-year-old niece to settle some real estate issues that her grandmother faced before passing away. They all stayed in a fly-by-night motel known locally as the Seahorse Inn, right next to the ocean. The stars ran the show that night. I almost never drove to the Flagler Avenue parking lot overlooking the beach. Not almost, never. But, that night...I did. I just sat there in my car listening to music as I always did when in my car. In those days the very first thing I did after starting my engine was to turn the radio on. Or my eight-track. I noticed a girl with long blonde hair wearing a black velvet jacket. I couldn't see her face clearly. I was about 40 yards away from her. I was way too shy back then to go up to her and talk. What I did manage to do was get out of my car, knees shaking, and go sit on the bench further down from her. I almost never did that either. This silent separation went on for about 10 minutes when suddenly a car full of greasers, three to be exact, as we called them back then, drove up to the fence in front of the benches whistling and yelling out crude remarks posing as compliments. I'm sure it scared the hell out of Karen. It scared the hell out of me. Almost immediately, she got up and walked over to my bench, sat down, and asked me in the sweetest voice, pleading if she could stay there and if I could pretend I was her friend. I knew I'd get my ass kicked by three guys, but it was an ass whipping I'd be proud to get. The stars seemed to bring them by at the exact moment I needed them to, so I could get Karen to come to my bench and make me look like the hero. The greasers didn't hang out long. They must have figured out my plight and decided to leave without incident. I lucked out. Or was it angels watching over me? After all, if they arranged my circumstances that would be the least they could do. Can you believe it? Three roughnecks having pity on me? I doubt it. How often does "that" happen? Karen and I laughed at it all afterward. Together... we laughed. I was laughing with the most beautiful girl... and we were doing it... together. It was low tide, washing my soul with high emotions. so we decided to take an ocean sand drive to the jetties about a mile north of us overlooking the beautiful moonlit night...sitting on the jetty rocks with the ocean waves gently sprawling over the big boulders. It seemed like fate for me. Yes, for me.. it washed away all my sins and disappointments... all of them. Then, to decide to go to the parking lot, go sit out on the bench next to Karen, for the greasers to drive up that very moment to harass us, then decide to leave without incident, and the ocean tide being low so we could drive my car right on the beach sand, and finally for the moon to be full giving us enough light to begin a new love..... I know it all sounds too good to be a true story, a cheap paperback romance novel, but, I promise you this story is just as it happened.  

Karen, I know you're not with us any longer, but, I also know you are somewhere. You have not died, just transitioned. I just wish I knew where the fuck where. I visit that exact spot in that exact parking lot every March 11th. I sit there just hoping I'd see you on that bench. So we could live our time over and over and over again. And just live our heaven... our heaven. Karen and I wrote to each other which were real penned letters in those days for another seven years. She spoke of us and how often she would think of pursuing our love over the seven years. She once said she didn't because our time was just so perfect and if we got into a real, everyday relationship we'd start to argue and fight as so many couples do and that would just break her heart. But, did she realize just maybe we wouldn't do that, and that perfect love she spoke of would just get better and better and better!? Damn it Karen... Damn it. You took my heart and never gave it back. You just let it die!! slowly...  Her heart never did break. My heart did. It breaks every day and has been for the last fifty years. How can you compete with a memory? 

The Lord says, "With God, all things are possible and nothing is impossible". I sure wish that was true. Maybe it is. Maybe one day I'd see that love that the stars dictated that glorious night. Why would God give me something so precious and so rarely seen and then just let it die?? Maybe it wasn't Him. Maybe Karen had to make decisions and failed them miserably. I found out later through both of their obituaries that he was her boss at the great WaWa stores and decided on all her promotions and raises and benefits. No wonder. I also found out he was bisexual and after Karen died, he went on to find the "love of his life" the obit said. Another man. It was always my guess that he gave her aides and she died of cancer from there. But, I can't prove that. It's just my common sense. Putting 2 and 2 together. He died from aides at the age of 58. She died ten years earlier at the age of just 48. Her obit picture wasn't the girl I met that Sunday night thirty years earlier. In the picture, she looked sad and depressed. Well, what the hell was Karen if he met "the love of his life" afterward? Talking of adding insult to injury. Karen opted for security and material possessions over true love. A perfect true love by her own admission. I wouldn't have expected it. I didn't. It hurt. But I did understand it. Being from New York I knew how hard it is to live a life of comfort, especially without an education. She had none. None completed at least. I found out she started a community college there but never finished. When she met her meal ticket she forgot about school... and me. It's who you know up there, not what or how much you know. All that can be taught and learned. It was. How would a distant love "too good to be true" compete with a bird in the hand of privilege and comfort? Understanding doesn't comfort the heart. Only a return of pure love does. Yeah I was angry at her decisions, but, mostly, I was hurt. 

We had five days and nights together before she had to leave to return to New Jersey. I remember asking her what town she came from. She said "Millville". I tried to repeat it for her and said, "Melville"? "No," she said. "Millville". I tried to hide back my grin when I said, "Oh, Millville, sorry, my mistake."  

There wasn't much time for us, but, I just felt who needs time? We found each other at last. One night we drove up to Daytona Beach to the Main Street area. On the way, I played Layla from Derek and the Dominoes. I was in bliss especially when the 2nd half piano part started to play. Absolutely nothing could go wrong. We parked the car and walked hand in hand underneath the beautifully lit fishing pier. If this was a movie, the production team would have lit up a high crane shot in a spinning camera following our whirlwind romance. We walked down Main Street and found this small little gift shop. We walked in and looked around. I can't remember if it was Karen or myself that found a pretty pair of green emerald earrings. They were not as green as her eyes though. Looking into Karen's eyes almost made my eyes green just by her radiance. I bought them for her. Years later, in one of her letters, she wrote she had lost one of them but still had the other. One was enough to remind her of our time together. I didn't mind at all.   

On the morning of the last day of our love week, she took pictures of me and began crying. I didn't. I was so convinced that we'd see each other again so why cry? I was still celebrating our love. We found it Karen... be happy. We found what so many others search for their whole lives! What is there to cry over that? Soon afterward, I had to drive to go to school as I had done for many days. I looked at her walking back to her motel in the rearview mirror. She suddenly looked up at my car driving off one last time. If I knew then it would be the last time I would see her I would have screeched the brakes, broken the door getting out, and run to her to be in her arms forever..... and never never never... even with tears, ...ever ..let her go.  

I write this story over and over again... I don't know why. Maybe if I write it over and again it will keep the memory alive. Maybe keep Karen alive and beautiful and young! which would be a stark contrast to her obituary picture. And, maybe she won't fade away over time. If I'm inspired enough to keep writing this story over again, maybe it means it really did happen. Even I sometimes think it was too good to be true. Someone had to make it up. Someone had to create this story because it never could have been so perfect. I wish it wasn't. Karen, wherever you are,...I could not love you any more than I do. And noooo! It wasn't just me. Was it? For seven years you wrote me and in all your letters you told me you loved me too. All that for a man who declared someone else as "the love of his life"? You deserved more than that Karen. Much more. You were a beautiful girl, someone I would die for. Someone I loved to the utmost for fifty years. They should not remember you the way "he" declared in his obit. Your son agrees with the paper to write that garbage. They didn't know your beauty and your radiance. Your angelic green eyes and your perfect cute, heartwarming smile. But for a moment in time, I did. And, I won't let the world forget you. I will make those moments become alive again Karen. Wherever you are my love. I will give you another second chance ... a second chance to make things right. Now that you know the entire story. The Lord said somewhere, "Only ask and you shall receive". I've asked Karen. I'm waiting for you. And I will never stop waiting. Never, never my love.