Samsara Express

Like so many nights before, I wake at 5:30, not dreaming, my mind racing but I’m not moving. I try to move an arm or kick a foot, nothing, my body is asleep. There’s a knocking at the door but I can’t get to it. The room is gently shaking, and I hope that it will jostle my body enough that it will soon join my consciousness. The knocking begins again. It’ll have to wait. I can’t shout although I can hear myself making restrained and muffled vocalizations. I just need to wait.

The evening runs through my mind, hazy, distant, gauzy. A delusion, a dream or an echo, I don’t know which, but it holds my unwilling attention in a firm, yet intangible grasp. We had been in a smoke-filled hotel disco in Ostend, not really drinking much and too old for other intoxicants. Georg had suggested we all take a dip in the pool. Mila was dancing with a tyrannosaurus and two other women dressed in form fitting leather pants, fishnet blouses and black ship’s captain hats. He ordered a round of Jenever shots for the three of us and I remember taking the first sip. The t-rex watched momentarily and then returned to the leather ladies. We were going to the pool.

Again, there is a knocking at the door, a steel screech and I fall from my bed. Body’s awake now. I push myself up from the floor, there’s a towel around my shoulders, the room is unfamiliar and I answer the door. I’m tossed against the frame as I open it. I’m sure we didn’t drink enough for this.

“Your ticket please,” requests a thinly mustachioed man in form fitting leather pants and a fishnet shirt holding a small scanner.

“I was going to the pool,” I say and he nods.

“I see. That would explain why you have no pants,” as he stares at me. I look and notice that indeed, I am in board shorts. “Ticket please.”

“I think it’s in my pants,” I reply, not knowing what else to say, “who are you?”

“Obviously I am the conductor sir. Please locate your pants and find me with your ticket.”

“Which way to the pool?”

“Pool sir?”

“Yes. I’m sorry I don’t speak French, Flemish or German, the pool?”

“You’re on a train sir. There is no pool.”

“What?”

“Perhaps you need medical attention?”

“No, I ah, I just need to find my pants.”

“Please do,” and with that, he walks to the next room and knocks on the door.

I return to what I assume to be my cabin and turn on a light and search the humble space. No bag on either of the bunks or in the small closet, and no pants. The room darkens as we dive into a tunnel. I sit and need to think. It doesn’t help. I don’t know what to do. No pool. I have to leave the room. I can’t sit. I have to move.

I step into the corridor and notice the cabin two doors down has a door ajar. It slams shut and I hear the lock tumble into place. I button my shirt and adjust the towel around my neck and proceed to the next coach. The train seems to have sped up and jostles about a little more, slightly challenging my balance. I keep a hand, fingers outstretched, running along the exterior wall. It’s a coffee color, perhaps a teak.

In the liminal space between cars, there was a whistle and the light flickered. I thought I heard a scream but it could have been my ears popping.

The next car is again a cabin car. A door midway down the hall slams as I enter the corridor. I hold each end of the towel in my hands as I pass through. A door opens behind me and closes as I turn. I continue. Someone in a dinosaur suit runs from the last room, door snapping shut behind. It throws arms wide, turns and runs to the next car. I clutch my towel and follow.

I’m stopped at the entrance by a steward. “Dear boy, where is your jacket?”

“I can’t find my pants,” I say as the steward hands me a purple tuxedo jacket and wraps my towel like an ascot.

“Table 13,” he said and shooed me away.

“There you are!” says a dark-haired woman in a low-cut green Naugahyde ball gown, “Our fourth chair. Splendid. I’ve ordered you a Sazerac. Sit before this hour ends!” I sit. “Someone famous, I think his name was Bud or Sid, I can’t remember who, said, ‘Form is emptiness, emptiness is form.’ We were just discussing this before you joined us.” My Sazerac arrives as does a blue drink in a highball glass with smoke pouring over the rim. The man to my right smiles and straightens his bow tie before sipping his drink.

“Yes.” He sighs and I can’t tell if it was a tribute to his drink or an affirmation of the woman’s words. She smiles and the woman to her right lifts her wine glass and watches the wine swirl as she lightly dips her wrist. She’s wearing a red silk gown and might be slightly younger but the three are all around the same age, somewhere in their thirties, I think. I sniff my glass and catch a hint of absinthe before I drink.

“What do you think?” she asks.

“Me?” I reply.

“Fine but complicated answer,” says the woman with the wine glass.

“No I mean...”

“Yes,” says the man and sips his drink again.

“Exactly, who are any of us really? Does a name give us form? ‘…in emptiness, there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no memory and no consciousness,’” and she inhaled deeply. For a moment she looked right through me and then seems to settle on me with a kindness and warmth in her eyes.

“I’m sorry, I don’t recall meeting any of you. I was headed to the pool…” and I began to stand up.

“A pool?” asks the woman with her wine glass turning to me, “Please let us know if you find it. I do enjoy a good swim.” I finished my Sazerac.

“Yes,” said the man, this time nodding to me.

“I’m Tara by the way,” says the woman in green. The train whistle blows. I exit the car opposite from where I came in, following where I had seen the t-rex go.

I enter the dining car and the steward looks at me approvingly as he tweaks my ascot. “Table 9,” he says.

I find my table, for the moment I am alone, and there is no menu.

“Can I get you something to drink,” asks the steward as he sets a water on the table.

“I believe you just did and it will be fine, thank you. I’m not sure I’m hungry. Do you have a menu?”

“Are you craving anything in particular?”

“No, I’m not really craving anything, is there a menu? If I know what you have, I might want something.”

“So even though you don’t really want anything, if you see something, you think you may actually want it?” asks the steward as he pulls a notepad from his coat and takes a pen from behind his ear.

“I hadn’t thought of it that way, but since this is a dining car, I thought I should ask for a menu.”

“I see,” he says, “so it really is simply by familiarity or habit that you decide you are hungry but not by actually being hungry?”

“That’s not…I’m just trying to find the pool,” and I notice the dinosaur a couple tables up, with its back to me.

“You’re on a train sir, with that in mind, I suggest you let go of the pool and have a salad for a starter.” As he leaves, I’m joined by Tara.

“Did you get the salad?” she asks and sits down.

“I guess I did. I’m not really hungry though.”

“Good choice then,” and she waves to the steward. He nods but doesn’t come to our table. “As Bud or maybe it was Sid used to say, ‘…in emptiness there is no form, no sensation…’ certainly is becoming of salad.”

I notice the t-rex leaving. “Tara, I appreciate your company, I’m just confused right now…”

“Pool on a train was a giveaway.”

“Yeah, well, I was on my way to the pool when the conductor told me I needed a ticket…”

“How did you get on the train without a ticket?”

“I think it’s in my pants at the pool cabana.”

“This could be a matter of the heart, Bud said, ‘….all lessons are defined by emptiness…”

“I have to follow the dinosaur.”

“Follow your dinosaur,” she says as the steward sets a plate in front of her.

Between cars the floor shakes somewhat more vigorously and I hear the water closet door lock. I wonder if I should wait or enter the next car. The lights flicker and I struggle to keep myself steady. The door opens and the women in red steps out.

“You’re here,” she states.

“Oh, hi, yes, um…”

“Call me VJ,” she extends her hand and we shake. “Are you going to the observation car?”

“I don’t know.”

“We’ll go together, come along,” and she takes my hand and I regain my balance. Her hand is warm. She pulls me, firmly but gently into the next car.

We walk to mid-car and plop onto a sofa. She kicks her shoes off and puts her feet up, waiving to a steward, who brings her a red wine. He nods. I nod back and he walks away. I lean back and look at the sky. I can’t tell if it is sunset or dawn, reds, blues, indigos and occasional golden flashes color the glass ceiling.

“I didn’t see the t-rex,” I say to VJ.

“Sometimes you need to stop clinging to things, ideas, people, feelings, so you can see, feel, and think about other things. After all, your body is here, in this space at this moment. Are you actually here if you’re looking for a dinosaur?”

“But I don’t have a ticket. I can’t be here if I don’t have a ticket.”

“Yet here you are,” she said.

“Here I am.”

“Here you are.”

“I was going to the pool.”

“Here you are,” she says as I watch the colors deepening, clouds spotting out portions of the sky. I feel the rocking of the train. Tara sits beside us and leans back, her Naugahyde bodice slightly squeaking as she puts her feet up with VJ.

“I think it was Sid who used to say, ‘Gone, gone, gone, to the other shore.’”

I breathe in deeply and mutter, “I’ve never met Sid.”

As I exhale, VJ says, “If you’re already here, do you really need a ticket?” and I shut my eyes.

My mind is racing but I’m not moving. I try to move an arm or kick a foot, nothing, my body is asleep. There’s a knocking at the door but I can’t get to it. The room is gently shaking, and I hope that it will jostle me enough that my body will soon join my consciousness. The knocking begins again.