Wandering and the Things it Wants

"I've got the world in my pocket, wherever I go!"

I walk the block, and then the adjacent one, and then the one perpendicular to that. Sometimes I make up a pattern like this, and repeat. A feeling comes over me that this is exactly like a dream I had, but I can't remember it now. Maybe this is a place I've walked before.

The dream was something about the feeling of home, and family.

"Such a beautiful thing I have! My little piece of gold. Where will we go today?"

I climb up onto the hood of a car, and jump, testing the suspension. I lower myself, slide into the open driver-side window nascar-style. I prod the dead radio, then pretend to drive. These are a few evening options for entertainment.

I walk another block-pattern.

“How many have we done?”

Many things are difficult to remember now. I do remember that it wasn’t always this way. My past now presents itself like a fuzzy photograph, a children's picture-book viewed through my fathers glasses, the rain soaked windshield just before the wiper clears it.

There was a war, and it was a long war. Most countries were involved. I lived in a rural area, which was nice, I think. When I close my eyes I see a beautiful log cabin, sun soaked, standing proud in a little clearing. Behind, the craggy side of a mountain. These kinds of memories are hard to trust. This could be an ad I saw. This could be a painting. It could, of course, be reality. I’ve decided that it's probably a little bit of each.

And as for this beautiful bit of jewelry! Two semicircles abutte, mirror each other, gracefully curve, then straighten to meet in a point. This is my locket, shaped like a heart, and I carry it with me everywhere. My little bit of gold is bound to me by a fine chain, and the whole world is contained inside. When I open it, if I open it, the contents make it hard for me to talk. I well up and burst at the seams, some fresh torture inside of me. Waves crash onto floating beaches, islands sink, rain drowns everything. I sink and drown, and I've come to love the drowning. I learned to swim in it. My emotions rise and burst like a geyser, and in this little keyhole-peering sliver of an experience, this patchwork quilt of untrustworthy memories, it is the only thing I still enjoy.

“And on we walk!”

I am looking for the woman in the locket. This is all I want to do, the last thing, the one carrot left dangling. My memory is not really the way it should be, and really this is one of the few things I can remember to do from moment to moment. And moment to moment, we walk, and walk.

Naturally this is a tall task, finding a specific human in all this open space. Hard enough to find any human nowadays. At some point I remember walking from the fuzzy-image-log-cabin to what I assume was the nearest major metropolitan area. It sure feels like a long way, even if I can't remember.

I walk. And walk and walk and walk. I sing and talk, talk and walk. There's so rarely someone around to hear, thinking out loud and regular silent thinking are often mistakable for one another. I pass abandoned sedans, abandoned minivans, abandoned cop cars. Sometimes I pick through, not for resources or anything material, but for artifacts, clues. Evidence of the woman I'm looking for, I hope. Or a scrap of something familiar, even. Most times I settle for pieces of someone else's life. These scraps too, are comforting.

Standing at the foot of an impressive gray structure, I struggle to remember what the thing is. A prison? In front of me is a nearly windowless cement cube, in a sea of asphalt. The building walls extend away beyond what I can see. It comes to me gradually. A gathering place? I decide it's something social.

I approach the front. There are panels of glass, something like windows, but in the place where you would expect to see doors. A large vinyl decal depicts an army of young men. Armed, resolute, marching, proud.

Enroll inside! Fight for your freedoms!

To enter, I slide these to the side. The interior stirs something in me.

"This is a shopping mall! I remember now!"

A shock of joy shoots through me. I briefly remember the shorthand of a part of my past, memories that took place somewhere like here. Purposeful walks with family and friends, looking through one shop, one vendor, plasticine foods, merry-go-rounds. My joy turns to hurt as I return to the present and all its solitude.

"I must keep looking!"

In my weakness, I go for the locket.

"Should I? No, no..."

But I do, I decide a little peek in the locket would be ok. Good even. A little look will set me straight, yes. I touch the engraved and well worn locket, familiar and comforting. It gives me warmth, life even. It swings open and my eyes fight for focus. For a moment I am numb, contemplative, then reacting. Something inside me swells. Swollen, I feel the rush, my eyes bulge and tear. I remember then that this is the feeling of home. I slam it shut.

"This is the woman I am looking for! And when I find her things will be right again."

I awake and find myself sitting on a tiled floor, propped up against a trash can. I am surrounded by a little army of round composite board tables, and steel chairs bolted to the floor. How strange it is to forget where one is! How long might I have been here? The building being nearly windowless had a funny way of obscuring the time of day, and by extension the amount of time that had been spent in said building. How funny! How strange.

Feeling blank and optimistic, I gather myself, continue looking. I pass many shoe stores, filled with free things, but by looking down at my feet, I can see that I have been to this store fairly recently, or somewhere similar. This is clearly some kind of shopping mall. The warmth of vague excitement washes over me. I can almost remember something good about a place like this.

In-between two stores, in the middle of the hallway, are stands where I imagine once stood vendors. I gravitate towards one full of newspaper.

War is here, fight for your country.

The front page was not news, but just this command. The image took up the whole page, and depicted a strong young man, geared for battle. His eyes fixed on something out of frame, some villainous enemy. His expression was not eager, not fearful, not angry. Purposeful. This is the word I decide on. I guess it's not too unusual to seek a purpose driven life. Many find purpose in less. I flip through the paper and find mostly this kind of thing.

Bored, and forgetting myself, I turn towards the monthly issue section, an area which seems more light hearted. Headlines in this section tend towards psychology, sex tips, sports cars and weight loss. My attention catches on a glossy, smaller offering on the top shelf. I reach for it, bring it down. For several moments I stare dumbly at what I am seeing.

I fumble for my locket, so urgently that I fear for a second that I lost it somewhere. Shaking, I hold my small, heart-shaped locket up next to the glossy book.

"My god! It is!"

I hang the locket around my neck, and nearly tear the book in half opening it. I open to a Q-and-A, printed around wonderful photos of the most beautiful woman in the world, a woman laughing, my woman.

"She's famous! And there is so much to learn about her here. Of course this will help me find her!"

This new information is downloaded ravenously. This is like the turbulent waters that spring forth when I open the locket, but this has so much hope! This is real! Sitting on the floor against the stand I read and read.

"My heart is full! Oh blessed monthly cooking digest!"

Time loses its track. The way darkness comes when the sun sets, my glee turns to confusion.

In a moment of violent clarity I am transported to my little house in the woods. The image is vivid, it draws me in, forward, through the front door. No lights are on, except for that of a small TV on a stack of books, on the floor. I see myself, sitting in a plush chair, transfixed by the image on the screen. A beautiful brunette woman laughs and smiles. She is in a mediterranean looking kitchen. It is a cooking show. She seems to be giving the viewer instruction. I look at the man in the chair, myself, at his simpleness and unwavering gaze, his weakness. I begin to scream.

I wake up gasping on the floor, in a cold sweat, next to the glossy little book. Nausea lingers.

"How, foul! I never knew this woman at all! How wicked that I could make up this fantasy, how much time had I wasted? Where was my real family?"

In my terror I stand and run. I run until my lungs scorn, legs protest and turn angry. I run past war posters and shoe ads. Past vacated pretzel stands.

I run more, winding down, eventually slapping the linoleum tile with my sneakers to decelerate. I find myself in a building with no windows, full of rooms with no doors. What a strange place. Is this some kind of warehouse? A general sensation of anxiety gradually leaves me, and I wonder what had made me feel this in the first place. Maybe it was just the feeling of exertion. I often enjoyed a good jog.

This all was suddenly replaced by a sweet and simple comfort. Just being in this place seemed to be the emotional equivalent of warm bread. Maybe I had been here before. I turn into one of the rooms. The walls were lined with new shoes, though curiously only the left ones. Feeling safe here, I pull out my treasured possession, my little gold locket.

"The most beautiful woman!", my emotion overtakes me.

"Things will be better when I find her!".