Illumination

Illumination

I could never see clearly and I have taken many things for granted. It was not until I felt I lost everything was I able to open my eyes and see what I had missed out. The little things we pay very little attention to seems to be even more important when there isn’t anything left.

For 27 years I have lived in Texas. The state bird is the mockingbird, the reptile is the horny toad, the tree is pecan, and the flower is a blue bonnet. In the 27 years I have lived in Texas I thought I knew everything about the state. I knew the facts and I read the history. I have seen the pictures in my books. I have researched the materials. I knew Texas. Didn’t I?

While things turned about in a nasty confused mess into a downward spiral there came to me a moment that will remain with me for the rest of my life. I had to escape for awhile to clear my head and to examine everything I thought I knew. Everything I had wanted to believe I had already understood.

I drove the same route I always drove to get to where I was going. I didn’t know why I wanted to drive to my family’s house. Perhaps I thought they would be able to answer the questions I was trying to juggle with inside of my head. Maybe they could mend my accidents, my failures, and my shame.

The sun was high in the heavens and the silken clouds hung idly in the blue. For a small time I was only focused on driving down the same paved road. Something overcame me somewhere between here and there. Somewhere in the middle of an endless green field I was overcome by something strange. My heart sank and I wanted to know what it was I was feeling. Instead of dwelling on what it was I saw a patch of blue bonnets on the side of the road.

Never in my years did I ever stop to smell the flowers. I took them for granted because I always saw them in this month of spring. I pulled my truck over and exited onto the pavement. I walked across the road and into the grass where the blue bonnets were growing wildly.

I didn’t just stare at them. I got down on my knees and I looked at them carefully. I made sure not to break them and not to pick them. I looked at their petals and I smelled their flowering blooms. I couldn’t help but smile because this was the first time I had ever touched a blue bonnet in my 27 years.

Time didn’t matter at this point. I didn’t really care honestly. I was running my hand over the tops of the flowers and I returned to my truck only when I believed I really understood what I had just done. It wasn’t the point that I looked at the flowers for the first time, but more importantly it was the fact I had stopped thinking and followed my heart. I put aside my preconceptions and didn’t care what people thought of me when they drove by me on the road. It didn’t matter to me. Not anymore.

I continued on the same road I always took to get to where I was going and another cry poured from my heart and I couldn’t help but allow it. I went to visit my grandparents whom I had not seen in a very long time. I was worried that I didn’t remember how to get to their house.

I followed the roads and remembered several landmarks which I remembered only because I came up here often while riding with my parents as a young boy. I didn’t know the name of the road signs but that didn’t matter. I followed my heart and the memories became so clear to me that I was but a child again riding in the backseat of the 80s Astro minivan.

I’m not sure what I was looking for and I didn’t know where I was heading as far as my mind was concerned. I continued to follow my heart and in the end I found my way to my grandparents’ house. I walked to their front door and I hesitated for a moment. I was so unsure of myself.

I spoke to them of my mistakes. I told them all of my mistakes. Not just from the past week. Not just the past year. I told them everything I had done that I was not proud of and I have realized all of this now. I told them about my biggest mistake which grew into a hurricane instantly. I began to cry when they told me that this was what love was. I hadn’t ever realized it, not really.

I wasn’t sure if I was crying because I felt so ashamed of myself. They always held a light to me as their eldest grandson. They had always admired me for who I was but who was I? What was I doing to myself and would I ever change? Were they loving a dream of what I was or were they loving me because they just loved me regardless of my mistakes. I was unsure.

I asked for their advice, after all they have been married for 52 years. It is so hard to find a relationship that lasts that long in this day and age and I wanted to know their secrets. Their hard times and their good were all so important to me. I asked them so many things it made my brain swell, but I did not find the answers to my questions. I was still lost and upset when I left. I had told them everything about me. I told them that my heart was in the right place but I didn’t know what to do about it. I told them about the one person I cared for most and how, in my logic, I may have ruined everything I aspired for myself. I was still wandering.

I didn’t know how long I spent at their house. It must have been hours because the sun was setting. Time was irrelevant. I was not on any time schedule nor should I be. I would take as long as I required in order searching where my soul was and why I felt so empty and terrible.

I then went to my Mother’s house down by the other side of the lake where I went in and smiled and hugged her and shook her fiancé’s hand. I acted like I was happy but inside I was tearing myself apart. I spent hours out on the chair overlooking the lakefront and the island in the distance thinking of what I did and how I can be sure not to do it again. I sat there to really be sure how to get myself right for myself and to find out how to make myself happy.

My mother could feel my pain and my sorrow and she came to speak to me where I told her everything I had told my grandparents. I went through the story of my life for the past decade and where I had been and where I am and where I never want to go again. It hurt her to know I wasn’t the perfect son she had always thought I was, but she loved me anyways because that’s what mothers do I suppose.

I spoke to her boyfriend and soon to be husband. I told him the same story. Every time I told the story I hurt that much more. I said it so many times to let me really sink it all in.

Who I was and what I was doing and how I was hurting those I cared for most of all. The story is not likely to be as tragic as others but to me it was disgraceful and it made me empty. I sought for their advice as well and again I was left lost to the answers I so desperately needed.

The next day I was supposed to head back to the office but I chose not to. I drove to my Uncle’s house where his wife was at home kicking around chickens and herding away the horses while the German shepherd ran around like a wild beast.

She spoke to me for a long time while we watched the cattle graze and sleep out in the fields doing what cows do best. She brought me a couple of books to look over and read. To take with me and to really try and find out what I felt inside.

My cousin came home from school and we all went to work the field. I wasn’t sure what was going on. I’m a city slicker and these were not my surroundings. I just watched and gave my help where I could. I had the chance to drive a tractor. This may not be an amazing feat by far, but it was a new experience for me.

All this time I was carrying a ledger to write down my thoughts, my failures, what I felt and who meant so much to me and why she did. What I could do to better myself for myself and how I could get her back in my life in the capacity I really wanted her. I just seemed to grow more frustrated as I finished the 20th page of the book. I was still no closer to where I was than when I started and I was so messed up thinking of dozens of scenarios racing through my head and attempting to find exit routes for those problems. It’s just the way I am I suppose.

We went to IHOP that night where I met up with my Uncle who was waiting for us. I told him my sad story again and fought back tears so I wouldn’t drive too much attention to the table. At times I failed though, but I didn’t care. They didn’t know the feelings I was going through nor did I care what they thought of me. I began to realize that I’m merely human like everyone else. It was humbling to know that I could be hurt like everyone else. For once I was actually feeling unrestrained feelings and even though they hurt it was new and exciting for me.

We sat there drinking coffee for hours on end until I began to realize that the answers I was looking for could not be told to me. He asked me questions I could not answer. He asked me things that simply frustrated me to no end. He asked me a simple question and I was unable to answer it because I was still looking at things too schematically.

The question was simple though. Too simple for me to wrap my head around and this was the reason I needed to answer it. He would not help me and I felt the need to leap over the table to beat him down, but I sipped coffee instead. The question posed to me was how she felt about me before last week’s fiasco.

The answer was right under my nose and I remembered her leaving me the sunshine song on my voicemail. At the time of the message it made me smile and I found it cute but there was much more to the song than I had realized. I hadn’t really understood it until the question was posed to me and she was hurt because I took her sunshine away from her.

To top this emotion my uncle had the waitress sing it to me and I just lost all motor skills and fell victim to sadness and I couldn’t see clearly with the tears flooding in my eyes. The questions were so simple but it was because I was thinking analytically and used my book knowledge instead of listening to what could answer the questions better than any self-improvement book.

I realized the ledger I was keeping would not help me anymore than those self-help novels and though I still have it there is no need for me read it again. It will become another historical record that will collect dust somewhere in my house.

That evening I went skinny dipping in their spa where I thought long and hard. This was something I hadn’t done before either. I was accustomed to taking showers and taking a bath but never in a spa talking about my life with my uncle. We discussed everything but my mind was also heavy on matters of the heart.

I am beginning to see clearly now and it tears me up that I had never realized these things before and quite frankly it drove me insane that I was trying to make things so much more difficult on myself. I realized I had to give myself freely to her, my heart and mind my feelings and my memories. I was no longer alone and I realized what it was that I was missing in my life. The emptiness I filled with sin and misconception. The very things which I filled my emptiness made me feel I had lost the only thing that could truly fill it.

I drove home the day afterwards, somewhere in the mess of my emotion I stopped paying attention and backed into a wooden electric pole with a heavy thud. Normally I would have gotten angry about it but instead I simply laughed it off.

I made it home safely and I went inside the house where I continued to cry for the rest of the day until I lacked the energy and the tears to continue. My eyes were burning red and my heart was aching with confusion. It would have been so much easier to have drowned my sorrows with a bottle of wine but instead of resorting back to what I was accustomed to I needed to feel these emotions pure and unbridled.

Even though I experienced so many new things over the week of my exodus and I had enjoyed my time with family I was still empty. I had stopped and smelled the flowers but all I really wanted was to frolic in the blue patches with her. I had spoken to my grandparents but I wanted their wisdom to be heard by more than just myself. I sat alone by the lake overlooking the island but all I wanted was her to see it also. I drove up to see my Aunt beat around chickens and I wanted her to giggle with me. I rode a tractor and all I wanted was for her to smile and help me wrestle the cows. I had been skinny dipping and all I thought about was her laughing and telling me the air jets tickled her feet. I had wrecked the bumper of my truck but all I could think about was what her reaction would be to me and yelling at me for not paying attention to the road.

So many things have happened and so many mistakes have been made. I am afraid it may be too late but I am following my heart this time instead of my logic and there’s something in me that tells me it will work out between the two of us. Something urges me to better myself for myself and to want what I really want and not what I think I need. I want her in my life and I hope and pray that it is not too late to make it a reality.