I Met Grace in a Ditch - An Essay on Perspective in a Paradise of Liars

Nearly one year ago I wrote the piece entitled I Met Grace in a Ditch - An Essay on Perspective in a Paradise of Liars. It's a commentary pointed at a series of moral downfalls that occurred in the Winter and Spring of 2010. These downfalls were sad and disappointing and came from a smattering of people too selfish to employ love. But the funny thing was that nearly all of these people thought they were loving appropriately, that their self-involved actions were misunderstood.


Let me be clear. There was no misunderstanding.


I'm a fair person. I listen well. I'm an intelligent empath. I often sing other people's anthems long before they discover their own voices. It's what I do. I'm not perfect at it, but I show some talent in this regard. With that said, it remains clear that I was right about the selfishness I saw one year ago (even with a healthy dose of stepping in others' shoes). I was right to veto people from my life who cared for no more than their own limbic desires; they were a slave to them and some of these folks still are.


And that's the sad thing . . . some of them are STILL stuck in a dark closet without a light to show them their shortcomings. They are too staunch to open their eyes to the advent of solid morals; they would rather just do things their own way. And I should be clear - there is nothing wrong with doing things your own way as long as YOU DON'T DO IT AT THE EXPENSE OF ANOTHER PERSON'S FEELINGS. And this is where, in my mind, many people lose their way; they forget the plight and care of others.


Self-preservation is a valid and very strong force, but it should never take precedence over the feelings of reasonable people. And I realize each of us has slightly different definitions of "reasonable," but that word will have to do for the sake of argument - and, besides, I think you know what I mean.


The moment when self-preservation exceeds the reasonable needs of others is the moment when it turns into ugly selfishness.


I wrote the following piece about this exact topic, but you should derive from it your own meaning . . .

***

I Met Grace in a Ditch - An Essay on Perspective in a Paradise of Liars

Some of us get stuck in a dark closet.

My mother once told a story about me in a ditch. She had come to the living room window and peered out. She saw me. A simple boy really. I sat there quietly . . . in a ditch, which separated our front yard from the street. My elbows rested on my bent knees and I had my chin cupped in my hands. My mother saw me thinking. 

I want to go back to that ditch now. I'll be damned if I don't miss that ditch.

And so now I am thinking again. Finally . . . I have a few hours of awake time to tend to the frenetic thoughts in my head, to make sense of my most recent weeks. You see, I am troubled. My thoughts have been forced to reckon with the cowardice of people.

Sitting at my computer, I look to my dark closet for some reason. I will be the first to admit that, several times over, I have seen myself crouching in the corner of a closet with my knees pressed to my chest and shaking with fear, ignorance and insecurity. Oh what a terrible place for anyone to be! And in this closet I have often found myself quiet, unable to see the transparency of things, unwilling to disclose what I know to be my truths. I am embarrassed to admit I have lied to myself and to others on occasion so as to escape difficulty . . . but wisdom eventually shows me such circumvention is only temporary.

So you see, I am no deliberate saint . . . I am no constant titan of bravery. My courage has sometimes been circumstantial and even accidental. 

In recent weeks, I have witnessed far too many people hiding themselves away, crouching in their own dark closets. Some of them don't even know they sit in darkness. It hurts my heart something awful to see them there, to make such heroic efforts to pull them out into the light - and to fail. I realize, in many cases, it is not even my place to help.

People are, oftentimes, the makers of their own darkness. And yet, they can be the makers of their own light as well.

The way I see it, and I often forget this, perspective is the only medium through which people can come to light. But how do you offer perspective to the sufferers of constant cowardice, to the plethora of people stuck in a paradise of liars? I suppose you do it with love, which is the best answer I can come up with in this moment. The problem is that love comes in so many forms. It remains difficult to know the proper application of love in each situation. It can take the shape of walking directly into the darkness to rescue our lost, blind friends. Conversely, it can be the act of walking away from our loved ones, leaving them to confront their darkness alone.

For guidance, my version of love considers dark perspective. When I walk to my kitchen sink with a clean glass to fetch some water, I think of someone bending their head to drink from a polluted river. If I reach home safely on my bike, I am reminded of the sound of my body colliding with the hood of a car. If I walk a flight of stairs, I can't help but think of a soldier who has only one leg or even none at all. When I am relaxing in a park, enjoying wine and cheese with the love of my life, I recall all the broken-hearted moments when I collapsed to some random floor, crying and convulsing to the point of snot. If I'm holding a smiling baby who smells of pure sweetness, I think of how my hands were sweating on the handles of my aunt's coffin when I carried her to her grave. 

These . . . are my daily thoughts.

Some say I am too dark, that my thoughts go too far and are unnecessary. And to them I say - I appreciate life too much to forget the terror that brought me to a better understanding of love.

And now, thinking of these past weeks and seeing so much weakness in people, I can only hope my courage will not falter in times of need, that I am creative enough to find the correct application of love.


I will definitely make mistakes.

I think I met grace in a ditch. Where is my ditch? I must ponder this some more . . .

An Anniversary of a Scalping

The date was March 20th, 2003.

The operating room was just around the corner. My anesthesiologist, a flamboyant and intelligent man, would wheel me in shortly and have me count backward from 10 while putting me under. But before that happened, though, I had to speak with a hospital lawyer.

"You need to sign here," the woman said.

"You mean right here, where it says I have a 7% chance of dying during the operation?" I returned.

She smiled as much as she was allowed, considering the nerve-wracking situation and explained calmly that if I didn't sign, then they couldn't, by law, operate on me. My pen scrawled. She shuffled through papers and pulled out more documents, all of them for the purpose of releasing the hospital from responsibility in the event of certain deficits I might suffer during the operation. One said I might have a heart attack. Another said I might lose specific motor functions like walking and holding my head up straight. There were others I don't remember, but the one that frightened me the most detailed how I might lose the function of language in varying degrees.

I signed all of them.

Cross-section Profile - MRI

About an hour and half later . . . my brain touched air. To get to it my neurosurgeon peeled my scalp back and snipped away some jaw muscles that were attached to the side of my head. That's right, I can say I've been scalped. Once my bright and shiny skull was exposed she drilled four holes in it and then sawed between the holes - like a sort of cranial connect-the-dots. They removed that skull piece and then had to cut open the menenges (aka the brain bag).

From there they could reach in and remove the lesion that had grown on top of my brain. I was really lucky it was on my brain, rather than in my brain. Invasive surgery like that is even more dangerous. The lesion, apparently, was yellow and about the size of one of those large 25 cent gum balls you can get from a machine at the front of a supermarket.

Gum ball in my head.

They never did find out why I had a brain lesion. The official diagnosis was brain bacterial abscess caused by unknown infection. I saw a lot of doctors shrug their shoulders those two weeks and a few of them even told me I was in the books - as in, the books of anomalous medical afflictions. These days, I suppose the source of the condition doesn't matter as much as the fact that I'm still breathing.

When all was said and done I healed. Eight years later the only physical remnants of my surgery is four titanium plates, 18 screws and one gigantic, bitchin' scar.

Let's talk about scars for a second. I love them. I'm attracted to people with scars, and if you're a hot chick with a scar I get fidgety and my palms start to sweat. I think scars are gorgeous and while they are aesthetically beautiful, their most attractive quality is the story behind them. It's the stories that get me. Some people fuss and moan over the advent of scars and they apply heroic amounts of salves and oils to prevent them or make them go away. Not me. I wanna see those flaws! I wanna see them on myself.

Now, I mentioned above the physical remnants of my surgery. What about the emotional pieces? I gleaned many lessons from my experience with brain surgery, but the one certain perspective that stands out the most is my relationship with morals. After I recovered, I had an intensely sharp sense of right and wrong. And what's more, I had far less fear in my way - a fear that would normally prevent me from acting on my morals.
The crappy thing is that I sometimes forget this perspective and I end up floundering in petty issues, but this is something with which all of us find a struggle.

Scar that looks like a question mark.

And what of my language skills that I so feared losing? For two weeks after the surgery I was having trouble speaking. At times, it took an immense amount of brain power just to get through a simple sentence like, "I want to go to the grocery store." Compound sentences were even more difficult. Luckily, this was only temporary and simply due to the head trauma. It cleared up and now I'm writing compound, run-on, verbose, chock-full, knee-jerk sentences in a blog that you're gracious enough to read.

So, each year, I take a moment to think about the stories and trials connected with this time in my life. I was 28. Imagine being 28-years-old and growing a brain lesion for reasons unknown. So weird. There are many stories from then that I did not include here . . . which is just as well because I have to save some for each anniversary in the years to come.

To Err on the Side of Kindness

Five years ago I went through the worst break-up in my life. I was living in Chicago; I had moved there to be with the woman I was dating. She and I were close, talked about spending the rest of our lives together and having children.

I should interject:  to drag you through the entire Chicago story would be unnecessary. Most of you have had some awful experience in love where betrayal came to choke the life out of your heart. So I'll get to the point as swiftly as possible. And what's more, I want to talk about what's at the end of the Chicago story, not the Chicago story itself. Nevertheless, a truncated back story seems beneficial in light of the strange thing I did at the end my relationship there.

To help understand the
deceit I read this philosophy
 book a second time.

This woman I loved began vying for the attentions of another man while we were still together. He lived in Philadelphia. They started calling each other on the phone all the time and sending each other packages - and my girlfriend started lying to me about it. It's hard to say if she physically cheated on me. Maybe she did on that fateful trip to Philadelphia months prior when she met this man, but I don't know for sure. And this is not a forum for such conjecture. It is clear, however, she cheated on me emotionally - and none of it would have been as bad if she had just been honest with me.

I broke up with her when the lies hit an all time high, but the real reason was that she didn't love me anymore. It was frustrating to be the one to do the work, to bring up the tough subject. I didn't want us to end, but I knew what to do. My bootstraps got pulled up to my ears that week.

The betrayal stung me fiercely and I couldn't let it go. We lived together still, which gave rise to another set of problems. I made our apartment hostile. I questioned my ex relentlessly and a day did not go by where I didn't remind her of her betrayal. I punched walls. I yelled. I cried to the point of snot - right in front of her. I think I even stabbed the kitchen counter with a knife. I probably scared the shit out of her. Looking back at it, I'm still not proud of this madness. It was wrong and while my ex deserved no quarter, I didn't blame her for moving to her sister's place temporarily.

Me - crying to the point of snot.

I had no friends in Chicago; I was completely isolated. I decided to move back to Seattle. My spirit had been murdered and I needed to be near my family and friends. I needed a safe place to lick my wounds.

But I still wasn't done with my ex. I needed to say or do something to make things clear, to show her a different version of love . . . one that she would never forget. I needed to find a graceful way to release her while defending myself tactfully.

My ex agreed to drive me to the airport the day I left. When she arrived at the apartment that morning many things happened, but the most important thing to mention (for the purpose of this blog) is that I handed her a sealed envelope. I told her she couldn't open it until she had returned from the airport.

We said our tearful goodbyes near the gate to security, huddled between some luggage and my poor cat, Eva, who sat frightfully in a carrier. My ex kissed me. I kissed her back. She kissed me again. I kissed her again. She went in for another kiss. I stopped her and slowly pushed her away. She walked away crying. That was the last time I saw her.

When she got home she opened the envelope and inside she found a voucher for a plane ticket to see her new boyfriend in Philadelphia.

Behind the voucher was a tiny note that basically asked her to not misinterpret the gift, that I didn't give it to her out of spite, that it stemmed only from deep, unparalleled love. The very last part of the note implored for her, in the event of difficulties or fear or indecision or a million other things, to err on the side of kindness.

This notion still guides me today. I employ this kindness in the face of fear all the time. But I screw it up on occasion too, slipping into anger and doing things that breed anger. It's challenging to stick with kindness as a way of life. We have tremendous pressure to fight those who trespass against us. Conversely, we have very little education and few mentors to show us a more graceful way. Some of my friends thought I was insane for giving a gift to someone who betrayed me. One friend even wanted to fly to Chicago and burn all of my ex-girlfriend's belongings. But I think my friends eventually understood the reason why I acted the way I did. And moreover, in this moment of clarity, I feel bold enough to say that love like this is not often rewarded - mainly, because it is misunderstood as co-dependence or insanity. Make your own interpretations.

The benefit of kindness is difficult to see sometimes and it must be given without expectation. When I gave my  ex that flight voucher I dropped all expectations to see any good come of it. I admit to having a hope we would be friends again one day, but having a hope is much different than harboring expectation. Before I left Chicago, I wanted my ex to learn from her mistakes and I obsessed constantly over the possibility she might come to me one day to explain her shortcomings and apologize through and through for them. Giving her that gift somehow helped me let go of that too. It doesn't matter to me anymore whether or not she learned her lesson.

What matters more is that I did my best to err on the side of kindness.

. . . and then I got better.

All the Dynamos Within - Part Three

***See the previous two blog posts to read Part One and Part Two of All the Dynamos Within***

. . . The dynamo killer looked nothing like I had imagined. I expected him to be a hulking beast, sodden with hideous malformations. Instead, the he was bizarrely handsome, clean and smaller than the average man. His smaller frame, however, was not at all diminishing; his toughness shone through with defined muscles, bulging from under his button-up flannel shirt and blue jeans. His shirt was red and black plaid, and he wore it with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and neatly tucked into his pants. A plain black belt girdled his waist and plain black boots covered his feet. His hair shone like black tar and was combed with precision. He stood before us as an oddity to modern times, looking like he had just arrived from the 1950’s. If it were not for the child’s quickening breaths next to me, I might have thought the dynamo killer was just a well-mannered gentleman from next door.

His dreadful laugh hushed abruptly - as if it had run into a brick wall. The dynamo killer turned the corners of his mouth slightly upward into a crooked smile and breathed in softly through his nose. He waited a moment and then walked toward us, speaking with a deep and elegant voice.

“My child, it certainly has been a long time since we last saw each other, has it not?”

“A few millennia,” the child said curtly.

“You seem perturbed, little one. What’s the matter – not happy to see me?”

“No, not exactly.”

The dynamo killer laughed softly, but then suddenly pointed his face at me and then back at the child.

“Wait a minute. Why are you here? I came for him, not you.”

The child didn’t answer and stared at him, her eyes flashing with defiance. The three of us remained silent. The two of them locked eyes and I whipped my head back and forth between them. The forest was so still I could practically hear a snowflake landing on the bough of a fir tree high in the canopy.

And then the child began whistling that same mournful tune.

This enraged the dynamo killer. He sneered and spat at the child’s feet.

“You,” he began, “you were the one whistling! You little bitch! And I suppose you also pulled those two mountains together as well!?”

The child’s mouth curved into a triumphant smile and she said, “Yes, I did that. Are you surprised? You’re a fool, easily swayed by the sounds of sadness – and you followed me like dog does his master!”

The child prattled on, making great attempts to enervate the dynamo killer with emotional jabs, but her efforts only worked as a temporary distraction. The child and the dynamo killer continued their caustic exchange, their voices rising higher and higher. That’s when the pressure started building in my head. And then a violent hissing noise found my ears, which seemed to stem from all directions. The forest, the moss, the ferns, the snow – all of it started spinning around me I swayed dangerously, leaning into imaginary winds. My stomach lurched and fiery bile heaved from my mouth onto a bed of mud. I couldn’t focus. Something blurred my vision. I felt heated tears fall from my contorted face and when I tried to wipe them away to restore my sight, the backs of my hands came up smeared with a deep, dark red.

I was bleeding from my eyes.

I could barely muster a sound, but I whispered, “My child, what’s happening to me?”

The sound of delicate footsteps trotted toward me and I could feel the hand of the child on my shoulder. Her voice was calm, but her hand gripped me tightly like bird perched upon dead prey.

“The dynamo killer has begun,” she said. “You must remain standing at all costs. He will tire eventually. We must make him tired before he draws from us our dynamos.”

The dynamo killer laughed from the back of his throat again, only it was louder this time and his voice felt like barbed wire entering my ears. I sensed he had suddenly gained the upper-hand. I blinked quickly in succession to clear my eyes. Raising my head, I saw the dynamo killer with his whole hand opened in my direction, his palm twitching and his face crowded with a terrifying smirk. I looked to the child and I saw rivulets of blood flow from her eyes, nose and ears.

“How very sweet,” he began, “the puny child, trying to coach the mortal. Hah! You sound like one of those weak-minded angels.”

He laughed again.

“Concentrate,” the child implored, staring into my eyes. “You must remain standing.”

“Why I am I bleeding?” I asked stupidly.

“We bleed from everywhere as the dynamo killer tries to take all that we are. He needs no blood kit. He needs no needles and tubes as the blood thieves do. He simply pulls blood out of you and if you fall, the gates of your heart will open and he will have you. You mustn’t fall.”

That’s when I noticed the front of my pants and my jacket were growing wet with blood. A red droplet flew from my nose through the air and disappeared into the dynamo killer’s hand.

But suddenly, I felt a brief respite and I heard the dynamo killer take a few deafening steps toward us. He growled and kicked the child square in the chest. Her body crumpled under his booted foot and she launched into some nearby ferns.

I was alone.

“You weak fools,” the dynamo killer said. “I’ve grown stronger since the last time I saw you, my child and now . . . now, I will have both of you.”

His head jerked in my direction. I watched his face contort with violence into a sneer of conceit. The palm of his hand rose to my chest and began twitching again.

“You first,” he hissed.

I screamed. An unbearable pain shot through my sternum and hope departed. The short-lived respite had ended and the dizziness had returned. The muscles in my legs began to shake and my bones were turning to paste against the incredible draw of the dynamo killer.

I fell . . . to one knee.

The child screamed and I could hear her moving toward me. I looked up at the dynamo killer. His eyes were wild and spit had formed at the corners of his mouth. And that’s when I noticed something strange about his skin. I started seeing shapes on his forearms, and the more he drew blood from me, the more I could see them. The shapes formed into darkened faces and ghostly bodies, swirling underneath his skin. The images floated up his neck and threatened to take over his face.

The child reached me and grabbed my hand.

She closed her eyes and shouted, “You will stand . . . now!”

And with that the child lowered herself to one sacrificial knee and I, in turn, raised myself from the dirt to face the dynamo killer.

The child yelled again, “He’s growing weaker! That’s why you see the captured ones on his skin! They are the taken; they are dynamo dead! They try to free themselves as he takes your dynamos! You must resist him until he retreats to contain the captured. Remain standing!”

The dynamo killer growled and flexed his palm against my chest. My body dipped and I nearly buckled again under the shock of his power. My clothes were soaked with blood and the strain against me grew exponentially, but I stayed afoot.

“You must find Grace! She will help you!” the child screamed.

I looked down at the child and she managed to nod at me just before the dynamo killer punched her in the head with his free hand. Blood sprayed from her face and her body went slack.

Her hand fell from mine.

My mind raced and my heart hurt. The child told me to find Grace, but the she and I both knew that Grace had died nearly three years ago. I watched her die; I held her hand as she shifted from this world into the next, leaving me behind with unrequited love.

The dynamo killer repositioned his palm on my chest and started choking me with the other. He clenched his teeth and closed his eyes to concentrate. His mouth hissed and clicked with indiscernible words from some ancient language I had only heard from the child. It was a mantra of some sort and it would see me to my end. It would be over soon . . . I would die.

Clinging to my dynamos, I opened my eyes wide while my strength continued to wane. I wanted to see any part of my world – for as long as I could – before I entered his.

And then I saw her.

I blinked twice to clear the blood from my eyes and I saw Grace among the throngs of the other dynamo dead. Her face appeared on the forearm that choked me and like a shadow giving way to dusk, she quickly began to disappear. But even when her face had gone I could still see her hands pushing against the dynamo killer’s skin, which seemed to bubble and fester with her love beneath it.

From my belt I pulled a buck knife that my father had given me many years ago. And while the dynamo killer hummed his mantra, I pressed the blade against his skin and sliced him open with a swift downward motion. Before he had even opened his eyes, Grace was already reaching out. I quickly dropped the knife and took hold of Grace’s hands and pulled with all the might I could muster.

The dynamo killer shrieked and wailed. His hand released from my chest and he tried to push Grace back into his body . . . but it was too late. I finished pulling her out of him and he could do nothing to stop it. Grace fell from his arm to the ground and then, after a momentary fit of shaking, she stood up to face the dynamo killer.

Grace was beautiful. I had forgotten her warmth. I thought she was dead. But there she was, standing before me, naked with porcelain skin covered with multitudes of scars and long, dark hair that stretched to the middle of her back.

The dynamo killer cupped his wounded arm with his hand to prevent others of the dynamo dead from escaping. He whimpered and moaned. Grace walked to him.

“It’s time for you to go,” she said to him calmly.

The dynamo killer spat in Grace’s face.

“I will capture you again!” he roared.

She smiled at him, sighed softly and said, “You will never learn.”

And with that she violently clutched his shiny, black hair with one hand and punched him deep in the gut with the other. The dynamo killer fought to breathe, wheezing and squeaking for air.

“It’s time for you to go,” Grace repeated, and then she pressed her lips against his forehead and gently pushed him away.

The dynamo killer looked away from Grace and eyed me with great menace. Looking upon his face made me realize just how light-headed I was from the attack. I could barely stand. I looked as though I had just woken from a nap, a slumber spent under the blanket of a slaughtered cow.

With shallow breaths he said to me, “I shall return for you as well.”

And with that he turned and walked away, holding his slashed arm gingerly. I saw his skin returning to normal with the dynamo dead receding deep into his body once more.

Grace called out to him with a voice dignified and serious. “Dynamo killer!”

He stopped at the top of the rise among the dense ferns and turned to face her.

“What do you want now?!” he yelled back, almost sounding embarrassed.

She cleared her throat, pointed her chin at him defiantly and said, “That wound on your arm – it will yield a scar of uncanny resplendence. It will shine with vigor and remain there for the rest of your days as a constant reminder that love is its maker.”

The dynamo killer spat on the ground and then stomped off. I started to black out, but before I fell unconscious I could hear the child giggling.

My legs gave way and my body surrendered to the ground.

When I came to, Grace was already gone. The child explained she had much to do to make up for the years she had been captive in the dynamo killer; she could not spare another moment to wait for me to wake up. Grace was like that, mysterious and fickle. And I was used to it; my love for her had learned to exceed the consternation of her strange ways.

“How are ya, keed?” said the child, smiling gently while she smoothed hair out of my face.

The child was younger again, about five or six-years-old, and mostly looked the same – save for an unusual exception. A yellowish, purple bruise stretched over one of her temples and into her eye. I had never seen the child injured. I reached for the bruise with my fingertips.

“Oh that. Yep, the dynamo killer sure hit me pretty hard. But don’t you go fussin’ over it, now – it’ll heal.”

She winked at me and asked again how I was feeling.

“Alright, I guess. What day is it?”

“Oh, it’s been a few days. I stayed with you, ya know, to keep you company.”

With the child’s help I sat up. The snowing had stopped, but I could tell it had dumped quite a bit on the area while I was unconscious. Blankets of white, higher than the child’s waist, covered every clearing, but I was still mostly protected under the thick tree canopy. I sat on a bed of clean moss, undoubtedly modified by the child for warmth.

“What happened to the dynamo killer?” I asked.

The child giggled, cupping a tiny fist in front of a wide grin, and said, “He left . . . and not very gracefully.”

I smiled at her, aware that her humor had returned. But even as I smiled, something felt different. I felt different – as if someone would attack me at any moment. And not even the child’s endearing presence was enough to shake this growing sensation.

“Something’s wrong with me, isn’t there?” I asked.

The child rubbed her cheek with the palm of her hand. She appeared to be considering her words carefully.

“Um . . . yeah.  He got to you,” she blurted finally.

“He? The dynamo killer?”

“Yeah.”

“What did he take from me? Why do I feel so anxious?”

The child sighed and affectionately smoothed one of my ears between a thumb and forefinger.

“He nearly took the dynamo that governs your trust in people.”

“Damn it,” I said under my breath, looking away from her.

“But don’t worry,” she said with a squeak, “you can build it back up. It’s just gonna take a little time – that’s all.”

“Well, I’m not getting any younger,” I said angrily. “All that work I did – gone. All that trust I built sucked out of me by some whack job in a flannel shirt. That’s just great.”

“I cleaned your clothes! They were really bloody,” the child said playfully, changing the subject.

“Thanks,” I said flatly.

“Oh . . . actually, I missed a spot in the middle of your shirt.”

I opened my jacket and looked down. A reddish-brown splotch covered the material right over my heart.

“I couldn’t get that stain out. It was too stubborn, ya know, and besides . . . it’s your job to work on that one.”

Staring at the impossible stain, I said, “Of course . . . right, but you do realize that – ”

I had raised my head mid-sentence and noticed the child had vanished, leaving me once again to contend with my lessons. I didn’t even bother to look around her for her like I used to. She does this all the time. She comes and goes . . . just like Grace. The warmth from the moss under me began to dissipate so I stood up to get my circulation moving. It was going to be a cold hike, so I zipped up my jacket and rifled through my backpack for warmer clothes. I found a hat and put it on. Farther down in the bag I discovered the child’s black scarf. I grinned, closed my eyes reverently and felt the weight of the child’s care drape around my neck.

I had to decide which way to go. The child had restored the trail and I was in the middle of my journey still, halfway between the beginning and the end. Stuck between two mountains, I could only go backward or forward. If I went back to the beginning, I would be under the cover of trees with a mostly visible trail to guide me. But if I traveled forward, to the end, I would come to open meadows clogged with deep, frigid snow and a path lost under a thick shroud of white.

I sighed heavily and began walking.

My choice was obvious, my direction clear – for all the dynamos within would not let me listen to the one that was broken.

All the Dynamos Within - Part Two

***See the previous blog post to read Part One of All the Dynamos Within*** 

. . . The tune was low and somber, and it seemed to emanate from all directions. I left the disappearing creek and hurried back to the trail. No one was there. The trail was empty as far as I could see. The whistling grew yet louder and then it stopped suddenly. I stared down the trail in the direction from which I had originally come.

Silence and an empty path.

I palmed the salty sweat from my eyes and slowly turned around.

"Ahhhhh!" I yelped and fell backwards onto the ground. The child had appeared out of nowhere right behind me and even though I knew she did this on occasion, it didn't make it any less frightening. My lungs fought for air while I recovered from the shock.

"Damn it, my child, why do you -"

The child interrupted, pressing a forefinger to her lips. "Shhhhh! Be quiet and stay down!"

She swiftly walked to me and put her hand on my shoulder. Her eyes were serious and ice blue. She wore her normal heavy dress, the charcoal gray one with black runes around the hem and cuffs. She also wore a knitted, black scarf with matching mittens, which was different. It occurred to me that this was the first time I had seen her in the dead of winter since she first appeared to me 12 years ago. Her hair was different too. Usually, it was brown and wavy and long. I had even seen it platinum blonde too, but this time it was straight, bobbed just short of her chin and the color of an aging raven, black with washes of gray. The child also looked maybe 12 or 13; her age was always different, but I had never seen her look that old.

"You're not supposed to be here," she whispered curtly. "You're early."

"I'm early? Wha -"

"Keep your voice down, he's coming!" she hissed.

"Ok . . . ok, but what's going on? Who's coming?"

I was getting worried, the child was usually playful and all smiles. I had never seen her so serious. If I wasn't mistaken, she even looked frightened. I had never seen her scared. My stomach started to hurt like I had just swallowed a snake whole and it was trying to slither its way out.

The child looked over her shoulder in the direction of where the ferns swallowed the trail and then turned back with a quick jerk of her head. Her eyes locked on mine.

"You're early," she repeated. "You were supposed to be here three days from now, when the dynamo killer had long since passed by and I had all this cleaned up." The child waved her hand at the stunted path behind her.

"You were impatient weren't you?" she asked. "You just couldn't wait, could you? You were supposed to be patient and wait it out! You sought refuge too soon!"

"Um, what the hell is going on? You're never this upset, my child."

The child sighed heavily and nodded.

"You're right. I must calm myself," she said, patting me on the shoulder. "We must be ready. There is no time to flee now."

"Flee from what?"

"As I said, the dynamo killer is coming. He was following me. He follows all things melancholy, which is why I was whistling that morose tune. But he was getting too close. So I pulled the mountains together and covered the path to slow him down, for even I do not wish to encounter him . . . not again."

"Who is the dynamo killer?" I asked, pulling myself to a kneeling position.

"Everyone has dynamos, some have more than others. They are the engines of our souls, the mentors in our hearts . . . they are the generators of life itself. The dynamo killer wants these elements dead; he wants us to follow him . . . to follow him into the caverns of despondency. With each dynamo he destroys in us, the more we become less of ourselves, the more we turn into mere husks."

A raging explosion blasted over the rise from where the mountains were touching. I could hear boulders cracking and rocks thudding on the carpet of moss. The child turned to the noise and began removing her mittens.

"Get up, my dear," she commanded gently. "He's here. You must stand and face him. There is no other way."

I stood up and placed my cumbersome back pack on the ground next to me while the child stuffed her mittens in a pocket.

"How do we fight him?"

The child looked up into my face, finally smiling with closed lips, and said, "You fight him by drawing from yourself all the dynamos within. You must place them together and ascend yourself. You must reach past all that you once were. You must divorce from yourself all of your sorrows. And when you've done that you must simply remain standing."

"All I have to do is stand?" I asked, sounding astonished.

The child's smile vanished and I could hear heavy, volatile footsteps heading in our direction.

"Make no mistake! The dynamo killer is more powerful than all the blood thieves you've encountered put together! He is not to be underestimated!"

I nodded at the child and swallowed the spit in my mouth, which promptly ran dry.

She nodded back and gave one last instruction. "Remain standing, no matter what. If you falter, you'll weaken. If you expire to the ground entirely, it's over and your dynamos will be severed from your life forever."

The footsteps grew closer and then stopped. I looked up from the child. A dark, sinewy figure had appeared on the rise above us. The dynamo killer placed his hands on his hips and let out a deep laugh from the back of his throat, which resonated with a strange softness, a sort of gentle rage . . .