The Presence of the absent

By Virginia J. Pasalo

 

TODAY I woke up from a dream, a dream that reminded me of a friendship that has always been present, despite its seeming absence. I dreamt of a race track with many people, and noticed a group dismayed by my arrival. Someone from that group exclaimed, within my hearing distance, “Here she comes again, we will not be able to ride with him. We have to find a ride somewhere.”

The next scene was in a hallway of a building, which I assumed to be yours, because you moved around with the comfort and confidence of one who owns it. And then, I saw someone strange, belonging to a more recent time, a staff of ISISCO in Morocco, spooning a portion of a cake, which your fingers took, and directly put in my mouth. This man from Morocco, what was he doing in my dream, and giving me a furtive glance and a smirk?

You were talking about a place, which you told me is owned by a friend, and that which I might appreciate staying in to focus on my writing. I was not talking. You seem to be the one talking all the time in that dream. I was not even writing, something I always did in a dream, I was just listening to you, taking in your words, and the warmth that flowed as you uttered them.

And then I find myself walking, in a cross section of a wide road radiating to at least six destinations, where three of your employees managed to cross by putting up a banner even on a stop signal, which dismayed the other groups waiting for the proper time to go. Someone shouted angrily, “Hey, guys, you have assimilated the culture of your boss, stopping at nothing to get what he wants.”

And it is true. You will kneel, you will cry, you will lie, to get your carrot. The stick never scared you. It amazes me, dreams have a way of encapsulating concepts of unrelated events, forming a memory of a person, and evoking the exact feelings as they were, a very long time ago.

In the many times my life was in crisis, you were there. Because I am not in the habit of profusely expressing gratitude, you might have thought that I am not grateful enough, that I do not value the friendship as much, and that I do not care.

I care and I remember. I remember a total stranger barging into my life, a mythological animal – half goat, half fish, with a horned head and the most childlike human adult face, from the second highest order of a human hierarchy in a constellation with three stars and real planets.

You were a star, around which planets have started to exhibit signs of life, but immediately returned to their dry existence the very moment you left. In this sense, your presence is an unsustainable relationship paradigm, ephemeral, in constant motion, unable to take root. Nonetheless, you were a delight in the garden of nymphs and goddesses who were too mesmerized to use their reason or to call on their pride as you touched their bodies, submitting to the pleasures of your touch and your words, accepting that such happiness will pass, like a conflagration quickly dissipating into ashes.

Our friendship evolved over time. At times, it tasted acrid, at times it smelled sweet. Sometimes it appeared to be at its darkest, and sometimes it exhibited its most ideal state of luminosity. At other times it appeared as clouds, taking me to a cruise in a blue sky, at times as lighting taking me to the center of a heavy storm.  It was shallow, as it was deep. And because it is true that the people closest to you are in the best position to do anything to you, your friendship empowers, as much as it can take away breath.

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