An opinion to have

All people want to do is talk. They don't really care to hear what you say. They ask you questions but there is no patience for the answer. They sometimes practice faces in front of the mirror to look interested. Their eyebrows go up, maybe they frown down or towards the middle, not too hard. Their lips pucker, an index finger finds its way to the cheek. People love that. They watch in the mirror, knod and grin.

“That should work,” they say.

When they do listen, it’s short lived. They can’t help but think of how the subject

can involve themselves. This is worse than not listening.

I have decided to stop seeing people all together. It’s winter time. I’ve retreated into the woods beneath frosted air and dead leaves in a little cabin in Maine that my grandfather left to me.

There's an outside bathroom that smells of cedar. There's a rock that sits tall in the front yard, to climb and play on. A sun damaged couch lies on the front porch in hopes of being used. Inside it’s dark and cold. It has always been the same. A sweet pine basement smell. There’s sounds of the screen doors and mugs with purple flowers, a dirty toaster oven, silly quotes in frames and pictures of family that I've only ever seen here. But nobody has been here for years. The perfect place to hear no one talk or pretend to listen.

I brought everything I would need to stay for a few months. The book, “Watership Down,” a sweater that's too small, given to me by a woman I loved, one pair of leather boots, a knife I stole from a man who wanted me dead. I also brought paper and pencils, and the contemplation of life and death. The only part of me I didn't bring was wine. I don’t need wine for this trip. Perhaps I would never need wine again.

I am sad. I am sad for many reasons. I feel too tired to carry on. What is the point of living without a smile? I used to skip everywhere and compliment with strangers and dance with them until I knew their smiles would stay well after I left. I used to ask questions to learn, sometimes I would sometimes even be able to answer other people’s curious thoughts. I used to love on top of mountains, in bookstores, on grassy hills, at the beach and beneath stars. But now I am too sad to do any of it. To be part of anything real.

Today is my first day here in the cabin. The place needed a fire. I went outside, found some burnable wood, split it with a dull rusty axe and brought the wood inside. I was warmed from the work so I decided to do without the fire. There was one bed and I layed down. The ceiling was far. It went on and on and I stared at one spot where the wood had a knot in it. I imagined crawling into that spot and staying there, squished and safe. I followed the grain in the wood, back and forth until I fell asleep.

The next morning was cold. I turned over to my side. My eyes teared as they closed tighter. I waited until I was sure I was asleep. When I woke up it was getting dark again. I got out of bed, cracking and waning as I started to the fireplace. Next to my stack of wood were some old newspapers from 1991. I crumpled them up and started a fire. I felt satisfied by how quickly I had started the fire. It was hot, yellow and red. I found a can of beans and heated them in a copper pot. They would take no time to cook atop the fireplace. I reached for my sweater. It still smelled of the girl who gave it to me. I held it near the door of the fire place until it was warm like her too. I put it on and ate my beans.

I stepped outside the back door and decided to climb the rock. When I was a kid it felt steep, I needed to use both hands and find cracks on the side to hold on to. I climbed it easily now with just my feet and a belly of beans. I stood there and looked out. I couldn't see my breath but it was there. Like smoke. It was mine. I listened to it, in and out, in and out. I opened up,

“I’m here! I’m here! Hello! I don’t want any of you, you don't want me! I’m here!”

I scared myself and I scurried down the rock. Half way down I tripped and fell. I rolled and braced myself for the impact. I grabbed for the cracks. I slowed the fall but still landed hard on my back. I am alone.

“I’m here, I’m here!”

My breath was hard and I was worried. But it felt good to fall. I was awake now. I wondered what I was doing here. I walked around away from the cabin. The ground was crunchy with cold, it went between my toes and numbed them. The roots were slippery. I kept on for a bit until the ground became pure ice. It was slick and wet. I stood there a moment, I heard the sound of cracking, I could see my feet in the light of the moon. I realized I was standing on the little pond I used to jump in and watch Canadian geese bend their necks and sing. It was frozen. I tried to remember how deep the pond was. When we were younger we looked for worms in the garden and under rocks and made fishing poles out of sticks with yarn. We never caught anything. I'm not sure that there were ever any fish in the pond, or if there was, they were just too smart to bate for our worms. But it sure did feel like fishing. I wondered what would happen if the ice broke. Maybe I would freeze to death or get stuck and then freeze to death. Maybe I'd drown in the little pond. I thought about this fate for some time. I stepped off the ice and made my way back to the cabin. I couldn't think of such things yet, not this early into my trip. I will go back tomorrow night and stand on the pond again. I passed the cabin and pressed on to the other side of the land. There was a lake there. A big one. My grandmother used to wake up every morning and swim from one side to the other. I would watch her while I ate fluff and peanut butter sandwiches. The lake wasn't frozen like the pond but it was much quieter than I remembered. There was no movement to the water at all. Just still liquid bound by control and night. That's how I felt at that moment. Bound to a feeling I did not want. Still wiling to live but stuck. My skin protected my insides, my heart read for a woman, beats of words, standing still, silent, a lifeless being.

“I’m underwhelming! I’m ungrateful but I am kind!” I stripped down naked and ran fast to the water. I let myself fall in, face first, the cold water skinning my back until I was all the way under. I swam with my head fully submerged. I kept my body down with my hands while letting my breath out slowly lightening my body. Some memories began fleeing from my incision to the back of eyelids where I could see them. I kept my eyes closed and watched them. I thought of my mother when I was young. A rock had rolled down a hill she walked up, a steep hill, not too far from the cabin. It landed on her leg slicing it open. She didn't yell or cry. She was my mother. I thought of my father shushing me while I asked him to play outside with me. He would worry over so many things, his hands waving around. I used to think that there were better things for him to worry about. My father was strange. My eyes squeezed harder. I thought about my first kiss to the woman who gave me the sweater. She was to be married to a nice man. A man I could never be. But I charmed her with movement and wits. I showed her a hidden way of living she would never have found. We were relatable and in love. But we were caught, our tracks were traced by the sounds of our laughter and love. We were found by a knife held by the man she was to marry. She was killed.

“I am here. I am here.”

I opened my eyes. There was no light and my legs weren't listening.