Life Is Confusing

The first time Alexandra heard “Life is confusing” by Langhorne Slim, was on a playlist her late best friend had made for her years back. Nearly every morning, Alex played it. Fresh from a shower, with a towel wrapped around her chest and midsection, Alex was trying to think of excuses to get out of brunch. Alex was the kind of woman that would whole-heartedly accept invitations to things, but with absolutely no desire to go. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go to things, but she was just never up for it. Generally worrisome, Alex found virtue in solitude. Home was her comfort blanket, her womb where everything was safe. Her brunch date was with an old family friend, one Mr. Ames Gleason. He was more of a second uncle to Alex, a cousin on her mother’s side, but someone who was awfully close with the family growing up and happened to be coming through town. Alex and Ames had been in contact through emails throughout the years. They shared a connection, a connection that had more to do with heart and humor, and less blood and circumstance. Ames was one of the characters that would come into your life at a young age, make an impression and it would stick in your memory. No matter how many memories you would be forced to push out to make room for new ones, Uncle Ames was never forgotten. Alex always held fast to her uncle. When she was little, at parties, whenever her mother wasn’t looking, Uncle Ames would slip dollar bills into her hand and tell her to spend it on candy. When he called asking to meet, she felt very obliged.

Alex stood only 5’4”, with dark blonde hair like summer sunsets and had speckled complexion. She, a 26-year-old, had a job as a hair stylist, an apartment in the downtown city of Manchester Center, Vermont. To call it a city is generous, it is more of a hamlet of a ski town nudged between cattle farms, ski resorts, and forest. Alex had found herself in Vermont following an ex-boyfriend. He was a tall guy with Nordic red hair and lumberjack features who accepted a job as a line electrician out of college where they met at SUNY Potsdam, in upstate New York. It was a difficult transition. Jumping state lines to an unfamiliar area with no friends isn’t easy. Together, they were fine. They settled nicely into the rural lifestyles easy enough. He would work ten-hour days four or five days a week tending to power lines across the next five counties, and Alex found a job at a salon where she made friends and found clients who became faithful to her. She would curate hairstyles for whole families, wives, husbands, and children and even receive Christmas cards from them. When there was a big occasion like a wedding or prom, Alex was right there doing up-dos and dye-jobs. Alex was a college drop out. The pile of schoolwork, bills, and exhaustive habits were all too much for her. Instead of returning to Brooklyn, New York to be with her family, she stayed in Potsdam with her boyfriend and took up cosmetology school. For nine months, she gave out bad haircut to manikins and eventually humans until she was good enough to make that leap into a professional career with a certificate behind her name. The green mountain state was not all where Alex had planned to end up, but it was where she was and was fine with it. The scenery was breathtaking. The people were nice. Sure, in the summer, the valley smelled of cow, but the pungent odor faded away over time. She just got used it. To describe her Vermont in one sentence; is green hills with spots of red and white homes and barns. Many people think of Vermont as a hippie state, and yes, there are a lot late 1960’s aspects to it, but the real estate and taxes are expensive. It is full of retired Wall Street hustlers, old money, and farmers who were wealthier than you would ever imagine. Many of the farmers sold beef and milk commodities that went directly to New York City and the money was good. The trouble was, in the disruptive wake of her boyfriend that she followed to Vermont. He left her after alone and with nothing after he got a co-worker pregnant. Alex was only 22 at the time and didn’t have enough money to make it back to Brooklyn but had just enough to stay in her small home for a while in Vermont. She had recently gotten a job at a hair salon and was hoping that her earnings alone would be enough to afford her cost of living.

The months and years were lonely after the break-up and she had fallen into depression, and anxiety had become an issue for her. It was nothing she ever suffered from in her younger years, but in those years, all of lives stresses weren’t on her plate. Panic attacks persisted, eating disorders arrived, but Alex never knew how to ask for help. Her family was a normal family and had their fair share of disputes, but all in all, they loved each other. Eventually, within a few years, she did get help and started on a regime of Wellbutrin and yoga, Trazadone at night, and work had become a home for her and a family.

Alex finished drying off and got dressed into a pair jean and an old maroon college hoodie. She was eating brunch with her Uncle Ames after all, not an eligible bachelor. She turned off the Langhorne album and she put on her sneakers and grabbed her purse. She wasn’t a high maintenance person but did put on the very minimum amount of make-up she could get away with. Enough to hide the shallow bags under her eyes. She didn’t live far from downtown Manchester; it wasn’t a big place. There was a single high school that boasted a state championship pedigree men’s and woman’s ski teams, and last place football team. Alex got her love of baseball from her Uncle Ames. He was a die-hard Yankee’s fan from Brooklyn and his daughter never liked sports. He would take Alex with him to games when she was a kid. He called her and said he would be going to Burlington Vermont for some reason she couldn’t remember, but he wanted to swing by to say hello while he was in the State. Alex hadn’t seen him in a while, years actually and she missed seeing him at family parties and talking Yankees. Those games were like comfort food. Unfortunately, during her depressive years, she had let go of some family and friends. She just could not find the inner strength to hold conversation with people, life was exhausting.

Alex got into her nearly ten-year-old Scion XD, the small hatchback was just the right size for her, but she felt due for something new, something that was more equipped to handle the northeastern winters. Alex was pulling into a city parking lot, a mere block and half away from the Davis Diner. She shuffled away from her car, her purse dangling from her elbow and cell phone in hand, and the other scrolling up on the screen. It was a bustling day in town, and the picturesque Vermont village looked as if it could have been a postcard. Alex came to an intersection, and the diner was in sight. What wasn’t in sight for the driver of an aging Ford F-150 pickup truck was Alex. The bright sun and glare from the windows of other cars and business windows had put Alex into a temporary blind spot for the driver. It was too late when the driver notices Alex crossing the street as he made a left turn right into her while racing to beat the looming red light.

When Alex came to, she was on her back in the middle of the street. Her eyes opened to the white and yellow rays of sunshine pouring down onto her face, warming them on an otherwise cool autumn morning. She rolled her head from side to side and saw onlookers just staring at her from the sidewalks, and a man furiously yelling into his phone and hovering over her. She couldn’t hear him though. Sounds was in a vacuum, and she felt lighter and out of place. Assessing the situation, the realization she had been hit by a car became real; all the sensations of pain and injury were missing. In fact, she sat up and located her purse which had landed about eight feet behind her. The man on the phone, the driver, was gesturing for her to stay down and still, and now other people were coming to her aid, but she really felt fine and even got up to her feet. Her balance was intact. She looked herself over and didn’t show any signs of damage, not even a rip in her jeans. The driver, still on the phone was taking orders from someone on the other end of the call and trying to get her to stay put, but it was all inaudible to her. She mouthed the words, “I’m okay,” to him as he was looking down and took a few steps towards her purse and picked it up. She then proceeded to the sidewalk and the onlookers stood staring in awe of her miraculous rebound from such a direct hit. She was coming to her senses and just kept walking, and a half a block down, the Davis Diner.

Alex entered the Diner, and she scanned the room and saw her Uncle Ames in a booth on far side. He saw her too, and with an excited motion, his hand shot into the air and waved her over. He wiggled his way out of the booth to greet her. He had put on a few extra pounds in his old age, but his gray beard wasn’t big enough to hide his happiness to see her.

Alex walked up to him and gave him a giant hug, squeezing herself into him. She stepped back and said, “Still wearing that same old Yanks hat I see.”

“You betcha, kiddo, you know it’s my lucky hat. I don’t know what I would ever do if I lost it,” Ames said with a big grin on his face as if he was floating, “Come, come, sit, sit.”

They both settled on to their respective bench seats. There were two paper placemats with a fork and knife rolled into a napkin on top of that, “I glad to see you Alex, it’s been too long.”

“I know, it most definitely has, but wait, let me tell you what just happened to me,” Alex said excitedly. Still, she felt no pain.

“Hold that thought, first you have to tell me what is good here, I am starving,” Uncle Ames holding the menu under his nose to look at it through his bifocals.

“Oh, okay, well, I usually get the same thing for brunch every time,” she answered.

“Lay it on me.”

“Okay, it’s kind of silly I guess, I order the eggs benedict, but instead of Canadian bacon, I replace with some avocado. Most people think that’s a travesty,” Alex said lowering her head ever so slightly.

Uncles Ames made a thinking noise while still staring at the menu and finally said, “it’s your special day, I will have the same thing as you. It sounds great.”

Alex smiled at him and said, “You can get whatever you want.”

“It’s quite alright, it does sound delicious.”

The diner was busy. Every table was full, people were coming and going, the servers were moving quickly carrying trays of food and pots of coffee. Neil Diamond was playing on the Diner’s speakers, and it couldn’t have been any quainter if it tried. A server arrived at the table and asked, “Good Morning, hope you are doing swell on this joyful day, have you had time to look at the menu?”

Uncle Ames said, “Alex, you order.”

“Okay, well, I would like my usual Eggs Benedict with Avocado instead of the bacon, and a cup of coffee, please.”

“Sir, and for you,” the tall man said. His bistro apron looked entirely too short on him.

“I will have exactly the same breakfast,” Uncle Ames handing the menu back to the server.

“Absolutely, you’re going to make it easy on me today. I will get that coffee out faster than a shooting star.”

“Thank you, kind Sir,” Uncle Ames with a smile, “Hey, what’s your name?”

“Peter,” the server said.

“Thank you, Peter,” and then turned back to Alex and said, “This place is great, Manchester seems like a great place.”

“It is, I have come to really like it here,” Alex said, “Oh wait, I have to tell you what just happened to me.”

“You don’t have to Kiddo, I already know,” he said.

Alex furrowed her brow and with a confused look on her face, slowly she asked, “how do you know what just happened?”

Uncle Ames placed both elbows on the tabletop and interlaced his fingers. Thinking, he let out a deep breath and finally said, “Well, because you needed me to be here today.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Alex said starting to look concerned and suspicious, “didn’t you call me to say you coming through town and wanted to meet? Am I confused about that?”

“Alex my dear, I am here to help you,” Uncle Ames said, “At this moment in your life, you could have had anyone be here, or anywhere for that matter, but something deep inside of you needed me to be here to help you.”

Alex sat with her eyes on her lap and was trying to think if she was awake or dreaming, was she in midst of some sort of celestial paranoid episode? “Uncle Ames, I was just hit by a truck walking into this diner to meet you, how could you have known that?”

The server pulled up to the table with beverage tray and two cups of coffee, a sugar caddie, and pourer of cream. He placed them onto the table and said, “your meals won’t take too long.”

“Thank you, Peter” Uncle Ames said, “Listen Alex, you were hit by a truck, but you were on your way to the salon.”

“Uncles Ames, you have lost your mind, it literally just happened minutes ago, just outside of this very diner,” Alex said starting to become frustrated.

“Let me try something else, remember when you were little, and we would go to ball games?”

“Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?”

“Just go with me. We went to lots of games. I was a season ticket holder then and you loved the ballpark. The sound of a ball cracking off a bat, the smells, the colorful advertisements all around you, and the baseball talk. Shit, kiddo, by the time you were eleven or twelve, you knew more about the teams line-up than I ever did at your age,” Uncle Ames said.

“Yeah, they were fun, I still watch the games on TV when I get the chance, the Yanks are the best, but what’s the point?” She asked.

“I’m not talking about the Yankees themselves, but I am talking about you and me. My kids never liked baseball like you, and it was an honor to have you by my side at the games. It filled my heart with joy. I loved showing you off. As you got a little older, the game we went to became few and far between, which I was ready for. You were getting older fast. You became an adult quickly. Baseball games with your Uncle wasn’t a priority for a teenage girl, and I totally respected and accepted that,” Uncle Ames said.

“Are you mad I stopped coming to games?” Alex asked.

“No, just wait, let me finish,” he said holding a hand up.

“I remember getting a call from you when you were seventeen years old and you sounded a little down and out, and you asked if there were any games coming up that you could go to,” Uncle Ames then asked, “Do you remember what I said to you?”

Alex shook her and said, “Gee, that was so long ago, I know we went to the game, so you said yes.”

I said, “you always have first choice and whenever you need to go to a game, you can call me.”

Alex sat silent waiting for her uncle to keep talking, but he stopped to take a sip of coffee. It was a little too bitter, so he added two packets of sugar. Some of the sugar jumped out onto the table when he ripped the packets, but he just brushed it off onto the seat next to himself. Alex asked, “So, how do you know I was hit by a car?”

“Alex, Kiddo, you needed me to take you to that game the day after you called, because you needed help letting go and moving on. You never said as much, but I know you. Your high school best friend had just recently died after a battle with an undiagnosed brain aneurism, and you were lost. You didn’t know how to deal with something so big. Coming to a Yankees game with me, was just what you needed. A hot dog with mustard, a pretzel, and a seventh inning stretch had you feeling at ease for the first time in weeks, even if it were only for a few hours. That is why you want me here with you now, you need some comfort, some help and guidance,” Uncle Ames said, “As I mentioned earlier, you could be with anyone and anywhere right now, but this is what your heart asked for at this very moment.”

The two of them sat in silence for a few minutes, Peter arrived with their eggs benedict with avocado, no bacon, and placed it in front of them.

“This looks good,” Uncle Ames said, “dig in, kiddo.”

Alex had lost her appetite. She was lost in her head, utterly confused, but also, finding a moment of clarity. Uncle Ames had certainly dug into his breakfast cracking the yolk of his poached egg and letting it run all over his plate with the Czech pilsner-colored hollandaise sauce. He meticulously used his whole wheat toast that had come on the side of the plate to soak up the runny yolks. Finally, he took the side of his fork, cut off a piece of eggs, muffin, and avocado smothered in hollandaise sauce and shoveled it into his mouth. Uncle Ames savored the creaminess of the whole bite, with the subtle tender crunch of the toasted muffin. Alex looked up at him and finally said, “Do you like it?”

“Kiddo, this is great! I could eat ten of these plates.”

Alex showed the signs of a smile. Ames’s enthusiasm was always something she had been attracted to as a kid. His love of baseball and people in general were always contagious to her. Uncle Ames kept eating and Alex just sat there and watched him. When he finally set the fork down to pick up his napkin, she said to him, “Uncle Ames, where are we?”

Uncle Ames didn’t remove the napkin from his lip too quickly, but softly said, “do you see now?”

Alex sat and thought some more and then asked with some trepidations, “is this heaven? Is that why I chose you to be here?”

“Kiddo, it’s not heaven, yet. You did get hit by a truck on your way into work, where we are now, well, I guess is the place you needed to go to help yourself come to grips with reality.” Uncle Ames said. He now had both hands on the table.

“So, I am dead?”

“I’m afraid so Alex,” Uncle Ames in the least disheartening way possible.

“Uncle Ames, I am not really a religious person, I’ve never really been a believer in all the heaven and hell business. This really doesn’t make sense. I always had the belief, that when you die, that is it. Poof, you’re gone, just like you were nothing before you were born,” she said. Alex was confused still, but her anxiousness had now slowed from just being hit by a truck to a cloudlike weightlessness with so many questions.

“Call this what you will, Alex, some people of a certain faith would call The Davis Diner, purgatory, some would call it enlightenment, it is whatever you need it to be; freeing and comfortable,” Uncle Ames said. His eggs were not finished, but he pushed his plate aside, “I am here to help you get wherever you are going Alex.”

Alex just sat with her hands under her thighs in wonderment. Her mind was racing a mile a minute. She still wanted to believe she was stuck inside of a dream, and still able to wake herself and come to. She wanted to be back at her home, ready to start the day over with, but she was quickly realizing that may not be possible. She said, “May I ask you another question?”

“Of course,” Uncle Ames said.

“If I am dead, then who are all these people? Are you dead?”

“The short answer, they are here for you,” Uncle Ames said, “The long answer is that they are here because you needed the hustle and bustle of someplace familiar to you and just as real as I am to you right now, they are as well. They could be anyone you want, but these nameless people are what your heart chose. You’ve always been a bit of a closed off kid, and when it comes to your problems, you’ve always preferred to hide them from others. Displaying your insecurities in front of friends and family has never been easy for you. The anonymity of strangers is just easier place for you and how you needed this to be right now. Does that help at all? As for me, let’s put that one hold.”

Alex wasn’t sure, “I guess so,” she did feel awkward and embarrassed a little, and said after a moment, “have I always been that obvious?”

Uncle Ames smiled and let out a little laugh and said, “Yes. I saw it, your parents, and teachers did to. That’s why most of them gave you your space when you weren’t in a good spot. They knew you needed it that way,” Uncle Ames took a sip of his coffee and then said, “Do you remember how many innings it took you to finally say anything to me about your friend that night when you were 17?”

“No, I really don’t,” Alex said.

“Nine,” Uncle Ames said, “Nine Innings.”

“Nine, really? The whole game?”

“Yes Alex. It was alright though. I gave you your space and we had a great time watching the Yanks Demolish the Orioles. They were never any good after Ripken retired anyways, easy win that night. Everything was going right for the boys that night. The bats were out, and the pitchers were on heaters. Despite all the stadium lights, we could even see the stars in the sky and the planes landing at LaGuardia. If I remember correctly, you even finished three hot dogs with mustard that night. I don’t think you had been eating much up until that night.”

Alex let out small laugh at the thought of herself eating three hotdogs, “Really, three?”

“Pretty sure,” Uncle Ames said.

“Goodness,” Alex said shaking her head, “wait, but you said it took me nine innings to mention anything about my friend. What did I say?”

Uncle Ames took a moment and then said, “you said, while watching the final plays of the game, I wish Amber were here. She would have had a good time tonight.”

Alex got all wide-eyed and shouted, “then you put your arm around me and said, wherever you are, she’ll always be there with you,” Alex slumping back down into bench seat and said, “Then I began to cry into your chest.” Alex sat there remembering that night, every moment, inning, pitch, and hot dogs. Even the mustard she had gotten on her Yankees 1955 pennant replica jersey she wore. “Thank you for Uncle Ames.”

Uncle Ames looked at her and said, “come here,” and motioned with his head to sit next to him.

Alex looked up and stared at him.

“Come here,” he said.

Alex looked around the dining room and everyone was still there eating, talking, laughing, coming, and going, but the volume of the room had slowly begun to fade away, just like when she came to on the pavement in front of the pickup truck. She got off her bench and slid into the bench next to her uncle as he made room for her. He put his arm around her and said, “it’s your night and the stars are out, and you are the brightest one.”

Alex just looked at him and began to weep. Her hands shot up to her face and her weeping eyes turned into a full-blown waterfall. Uncle Ames squeezed her into him, and she put her arms around him and buried her face into his ever-growing stomach and chest. She let it out, she shed every tear she had left in her body out onto his brown sweater. Together they sat embraced for what felt like eternity, but eternity was all she had left. Finally, with a few errant sniffles and a wipe of her face, that was now beet red and damp, she relaxed herself away from her uncle. His arm was still around her, but he loosened his grip and the air settled between them. With her other hand, Uncle Ames brushed some of her light brown sugar colored hair off her cheek and leaned in and kissed her forehead and said, “There will always been someone there for you Alex, no matter what.”

Alex said, “I know. I know now,” she paused then said, “What happens now?”

“Now?”

“Yeah, like, right now?”

“Right now, how about we pay the bill and move on, sound good?”

“Yeah, sounds great.” Alex said with curious fears of what happens next.

Ames took his arm off her of shoulder and with one finger in the air, she raised it to the sky and flagged down their server and gestured for him to come to the table.

Peter made his way over to the table and instead of clearing the plates, he sat down behind Alex’s uneaten meal and said, “How are you doing, Alex?”

One more time during her meal she the look look of confusion came across her face, but she answered and said, “I’m okay, I think. Thank you for asking. How do you know my name?”

“Alex, I want to introduce you to someone. This is Peter,” Uncle Ames said.

“Yeah, I know. He told us his name already,” Alex said curiously.

“Alex, this is Saint Peter, builder of the heavens. He built the gates to the kingdom of heaven strong enough to that no Hell shall overcome it,” Uncle Ames said.

Alex just stared at him and took a moment, then finally said, “aren’t you supposed have a beard or something?”

Peter and Ames let out of bellowing laugh, “Now Alex, that was not what I thought you were going to say first to me. Frankly, this counties health board prevents me having a beard wherever food is being prepared. I guess, I could wear a beard net over it, but who would want to wear one of those. Alex, I had to get rid of it for this gig,” Peter turned his gaze to Ames and asked, “Is she ready? Does she understand?”

Ames nodded his head in the affirmative, and said, “I believe so.”

“Good. Alex are you ready to go home? See what’s next?”

Alex thought for a moment and asked, “So, there is a heaven?” Peter just smiled back at her without saying anything, then Alex said, “Yes. Yes, I’m ready.”

Peter’s smile grew and he reached his hand out, and took Alex’s into his hand and said, “Everything will be okay.”

“I believe you,” Alex said. Peters’ hands were warm and tender.

“Ames, it is time, you can show her to her stars,” Peter said releasing Alex’s hand from his and gestured to the door.

“Peter, thank you,” Uncle Ames said.

“Will I see you again?” Alex asked. Peter just smiled at her and the sparkle in his eyes spoke enough words to tell her everything she needed to know, “Thank you, Saint Peter.”

He bowed his head to her and kept smiling.

“C’mon kiddo, let’s go,” Uncle Ames said. As they scooted out of the booth and took to their feet, the restaurant was now empty. It was just Alex, Uncle Ames, and Peter. Alex looked back and Saint Peter as he sat there smiling, she turned to her uncle and he said, “it’s time,” he put his arm around her, and they walked toward the main entrance to the diner.

Alex asked, “Has Saint Peter always been a waiter?”

Uncle Ames laughed out loud and said, “Kiddo, you always could make me laugh, but no, just today and just for you. For someone else, he may appear as a doctor, and electrician, or Priest, or pirate, remember this is what you to see the stars.”

“I think I get it now,” Alex said as they kept walking.

The two of them made it to the front door and Uncle Ames opened it and let Alex step through. They entered a dark tunnel, but there was light at the end of the tunnel. It was small and looked like a lone star in an otherwise empty night sky, but as they kept walking side by side. The star was in front of them, and an audible white noise began to grow. Alex was nervous, but she trusted her Uncle Ames, and how could she not trust a Saint? Soon, the light at the end of the tunnel began to resolve itself and grow. It was not just one light, it was a grid of lights, high in the night sky. The noise was growing, and the low hum began to sound familiar. A few more yards closer to the end of the tunnel the light had begun to penetrate the tunnel and illuminated the inside. It was all concrete with handrails down the side of the ramp leading to the light. They were painted dark blue, and there was a sticky wet mess running down the concrete. Both Alex and Ames stepped around the mess. The tunnel began to look familiar to Alex, the smells, and then finally there it was, crack! The noise instantly grew, and Alex turned to her uncle and said, “Yankee Stadium?”

“Go look,” Uncle Ames said to her. Alex took off like a little child attending her first ball game. She emerged to the lower level to face a packed house. She looked around in wonderment and smiled, “Welcome home, kiddo.”

Standing in pure silence and with eyes as wide as they could ever be, she was in utter disbelief. Her polka-dotted face had fallen rosy and glimmered. The late summer evening air felt like perfection and even the flies buzzing around the light poles were joyfully playing. Taking it all in Alexandra finally said, “You know, life is confusing, but I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”