Appalachia

Most people forget their previous lives upon being reborn. Occasionally you hear stories of small children recalling memories that they certainly couldn’t have experienced, such as being married or having babies of their own. But as they grow up, these memories fade into the new ones being made and all such history of a previous life is lost to the mystery of time. But some small things may linger into adulthood. A kinship with a location or time period. A style of music or a type of cuisine.

I was born and raised in Oregon’s vast Willamette Valley, a sprawling oak savannah that was the destination for many settlers on the Oregon Trail. Yet when my parents took me into the Cascade Mountains to the east, there was a kind of remembrance that could only come from a previous life lived in the mountains. Whoever I had been before lived somewhere in mountains far older, where clawhammer banjo interlaced with fiddle music brought from Scottish immigrants to make something new. Though I had never been to the American southeast, Appalachia felt like home in a way that could only be understood if I had lived there before in a previous life.

I didn’t always believe in past lives. Not like this. But as most (all) religious or spiritual awakenings go, it came because these beliefs had something to offer me at a time when I was floundering. I was in love with this woman, who shall not be named for fear the old gods will somehow invoke her presence, and I was convinced she and I had known each other in a past life. This brought me immense comfort. Laugh all you want, but lesbian yearning is on a level that most straights cannot understand. She was rotten, like a mouth full of cavities and crumbling teeth, yet I loved her.

I read up on all the past lives stuff I could find on the pseudo-spiritual side of the internet. Soulmates, twin flames, divine counterparts, all of it. And no matter what I learned, I tried to fit her and me into the narrative, even if it didn’t make sense. And it didn’t. Like many religious beliefs, it is necessary to suspect disbelief and force the pieces into their places, even if you know deep down it isn’t real. I loved her so badly and she was married to a man. She said she loved me, but she wouldn’t leave him. It was like that Chappell Roan song, “Good Luck Babe.”

But if we had been married in a past life, or even just known each other in a past life, maybe it meant we’d be together in this life. And thus, my belief in past lives was born out of desperation.

The internet said that if you knew someone in a past life, you’d recognize them immediately upon your very first meeting. This was, of course, not the case for me and this woman. I don’t even recall our first meeting. We were classmates for a long time before we became friends, and even then, it took me years of close friendship before I fell in love with her. There was no instant recognition or remembrance. When I spoke to other past life believers, I lied when I told this part of my story.

Thankfully, I began to heal and eventually walked away from the woman who could never love me properly. I maintained my kinship with Appalachia, however, picturing myself as a curmudgeonly granny with a wrinkled face and a white bird’s nest of bun pinned up on my head. But there was no one, I decided, that I had shared that past life with that had followed me into my current life.

“Do I know you?” a voice called from behind me. An androgynous voice, one that could have belonged to anyone. Their accent was familiar, as if they’d come from a place I’d been before.

I whirled around to face them, a person of ambiguous gender, wearing an outfit that appeared to have been pulled straight from an Americana folktale. I was about to say that there was no possible way they knew me, but as their eyes met mine, the words vanished from my tongue as my mouth fell open in shock.

All of the sound in the little coffee shop went silent. The dull hum of patrons chatting, the occasional hiss of steam from the espresso machine, and the sound of cars from the street outside faded into a noiselessness. My vision focused on them, everything else fading into a blur in the background. This was the feeling I’d read about. This was what instant recognition at the very first meeting felt like. They were beautiful, they were handsome, and they were unlike anyone I’d ever seen.

“Have we met before?” I stammered, something deep inside of me recognizing something deep inside of them. Holy shit. It was all real. There was no faking it, or trying to make the pieces fit.

They ran their fingers through their long hair, pushing it from their face like Hozier does as he performs. We both seemed to be at a loss of words. Did they recognize me? There was no way. This had to be some sort of dream or hallucination. Any lingering feelings I’d had for the woman who broke my heart faded into the background, as if she’d never even existed. I scolded my heart as it quickened its pace, warning it not to get invested in this literal stranger. I was not ready for another heartbreak. I was not prepared to be let down yet again.

“I know you,” they said, tilting their head to the side to examine me. “I don’t know how, but I do.”

My breath caught in my throat, my larynx closing around any words that might have tried to come out. They took a step towards me and touched the lapel of my jacket, their thumb brushing across the enamel pin I always wore.

“Trillium,” they said. Then they took an awkward step back, perhaps remembering that we were strangers. Or we were supposed to be strangers.

“It’s a wildflower,” I mumbled, even though it was clear this person knew what it was.

“Did you know they grow in North Carolina too?” they asked. “All throughout Appalachia really.”

“Oh,” I said, heat rising in my face. “I didn’t know that.”

“I’ve never been,” they said with a little laugh. “But you remind me of that place for some reason.”

“Couldn’t imagine why,” I said with a smile.