Autumn's Long Shadows

Those early autumn nights weighed on my soul with an almost tangible pressure, like a heavy fog pushing down onto my thoughts and my heart and body to an almost crippling effect. I would sit on the porch, the evening dimness slowly giving way to complete darkness, immobile and detached. There was so much feeling that there was no feeling, except the tingling in the pit of my stomach growing and growing like a balloon that would never burst.

Nostalgia crept over me on these nights—comforting thoughts that perhaps all was possible so many years ago. We were fresh and young and never wary. That which came next was better than what had come just before. Those memories were for all the best music, the best books, the best movies and shows, the best conversations, the best laughter, the best times for sure. We were all in love with the right one. We invented sex all over again. No mistakes. It was the only time to be alive.

And now the child’s house beside me was empty and devoid of all these elements which once seemed so real. And the days gave way to nights and I did not dare fall asleep lest I give permission to the darkness. So there I sat, alone and frozen on the porch, looking out toward the woods. Things can end.

Crisp cool evening air once inspired. Get out of the house, young one. Find your friends. Entertain away the long nights and sleep through the mornings. Your parents are fine and happy. The future is bright. There was an indelible impression that this is the unmoving way of it. Like a foundation.

Crisp cool evening air now tortured. Winter is coming. I sat like an old mossy statue on the porch, night after night. The foundation holds but what it supports is gray and fleeting.

Less than a year ago, I was jolted from the malaise at the life I had made so far from this place. It struck me out of the blue. That a marriage can end is so well known, but after what she told me I’m not sure it ever really began. I still do not understand.

Did that relationship ever speak to my origins? Whom did I love before but did not pursue? Did I discount this town—this lovely, beautiful, bucolic setting of my youth—to pursue something that I didn’t want? To find someone who would never love me? Thank God there were no children, but oh my God why didn’t we have children?

And in the midst of these doubts the phone rang. Dad was unwell. Mom was unwell. Come home now. Months…only months left for each. I pushed the doubts away to help, and in the end all I could do was watch them go. Then I grieved. And then I doubted again.

My brother, the enigma, came and said some things that sounded right. He was there at the very end. Then his wife hurried him off. The baby needed to get back home. He had never looked back before. He didn’t look back this time. He was never rooted here.

I stayed behind to get things in order. During the day I pretended to pack boxes. I sorted through old things. Wonderful things. Amazing things. I read all the old letters. I looked at all the old photos. An entire day could pass in a maze of memories, many of them not even my own.

And at night I sat on the dark porch, staring into the darkness. The woods ahead of me; the untended fields off to the left.

When young I thought farming a vestige of the past: irrelevant. The deeds and letters of my great-grandfather, now in a tidy box, told a different story. This land gave life. It sired the next generation and the one after that. Now it was all down to half-tended fields shrunken by my father’s infirmity, jumbled brush overtaking more acres each year. The old barn creaked in the wind, decades after the last repair, and perhaps only years from collapse.

I did not regret leaving in pursuit of what I thought were my dreams. I regretted leaving for the wrong dreams.

The sullen pattern continued. Long days led to the long nights, awake and quiet on the dark porch. Sometimes I dozed off. Other nights I stumbled in for bed when shivering cold or after good sense prevailed. Eventually, the harvest moon began to wax, and the nights grew just a bit brighter. Before, I could only hear the screech of the barn owls, the cooing of the doves and chirping of the raccoons. Now, I could see the silhouettes of the deer as they took their nightly path across the fields aglow in moonlight. The low fox shapes darted in and out of the wood line, using the illumination to look for rodents.

Then, one bright night, my friend appeared. Silently, like the flighted hunter it was, the barn owl swept down and landed on the porch rail in front of me. It was just over a foot tall with its downy heart-shaped white face wrapped around two large black eyes. Staring at me.

I had seen one years before. Quite literally, they had lived in the barn. My father let them nest high above the rafters, their favorite spot in the hollow of an unused joint in a hand-hewn beam. When I was little, I liked to peak up at the little owlets and their dancing heads. He said they took care of pests and my father encouraged them year after year.

The owl kept its eyes trained on me. I just stared back and tried not to startle him. For what seemed like an hour he perched in one spot, unmoving. My mind was blank, at peace, and surprisingly unaroused by this strange appearance. And then, without warning, it gave a quick flutter of its wings, barely audible, and the barn owl silently retreated back into the night.

The next day I thought more about the encounter. Special, yes, but an occurrence that would not repeat itself. I pretended to organize the household items and the hours plodded along.

Trying not to anticipate a second visit, I brought myself out for my nightly ritual, a blanket on my lap so that the cold would not deter me. The first hour—nothing. The second, the same. As the night wore on, I convinced myself that no wild animal would call on a human willingly.

Suddenly, there it was. A whoosh in the air signaled the owl’s arrival, its talons wrapping quickly and sturdily on the rail. It sat, staring with its beautiful and haunting visage. I stared back silently for many minutes, permitting myself to wonder.

“Hello,” I said, breaking the silence.

I expected a startled reaction and a fleeing creature. Instead, it stared back all the more.

“Nice night,” I offered. The owl only stared in reply.

I said nothing for a while, and then I told the barn owl about my father’s approval of its species. I invited it to stay in the barn and find a mate and nest there. I knew it could not speak, but I conjectured aloud on its behalf that it may already live there, finding suitable food among the fields and woods. My words kept rattling off, and I spoke to it for perhaps twenty minutes. Then, as suddenly as it came, it flew off.

I went inside and went right to sleep.

The following morning was different. I did not pack anything up. I did not pretend to organize. I went for a walk in the woods and enjoyed the red and yellow foliage. Then I went into town for lunch. I struck up a conversation with someone who knew my parents. Not well, but he had some memories to share. It was good to hear his story.

On the third night I did not try to dampen my enthusiasm. I waited and expected its arrival. On this night, the moon was at its fullest and I saw the shadow of the owl come from the barn, sail across the yard, and land without a sound on the porch rail.

“Good evening, friend.”

And so the conversation began. I told the owl about the joys of growing up in this beautiful place. I spoke of my mother’s humor and the way she made everyone feel welcome. I told tales of my father’s wisdom, the type of strong, silent character that goes unnoticed by a young son but that, over time, grows profound in hindsight. I spoke of regrets that I did not know my brother as well as I could.

I mentioned friends. Those guys I had played with. The guys I learned from, and those who learned from me. The ones I cared about the most. It’s interesting to realize that you stop making those sorts of friends at some point. Why?

And the girls. Oh, yes. There was that one I can never forget. Red hair. She is married now, I’m sure. I should have kept in touch with her. She made me laugh. That was it. Not just laugh but lose myself in laughter, abandoning all pretense. When did I stop seeking women who made me happy? There were a dozen girls in my youth who wanted to make me happy in some way. Perhaps I thought I did not deserve it. What a fool.

I asked the owl a few questions. I asked him whether he thought there was a meaning to life. I asked him whether he missed seeing the fruits of his labor. I asked him if what he was looking for was always the most obvious thing, so he kept looking. I asked him if it was too late to start over.

The owl stared back. We sat silently for a good long while. I thanked him, stood up, and went inside to sleep.

The next morning I made myself breakfast and looked at the ancient lined paper pinned next to the phone, names and numbers scribbled in my father’s hand. I found the one I was looking for and picked up the receiver. I put my finger in the old rotary dial, playing it back and forth a little before I committed.

“Mr. Davies? Yes, hello, this is Ed’s son. Yep… Hey, I was wondering: Do you think we could get that old tractor going again by spring?”