Cay

You could tell he was an old man by the hollowed lines and furrows on his sun-toasted face and eyelids that drooped over his eyes making it harder for him to see than in years passed. Many would say he was wrinkled. But his lines, to him, were the roadmap of his life and experiences. Some of those, however, were now long forgotten while others remained as vivid as if he could relive each and every one whenever he chose. Since his wife was no longer living, his family had moved far away, he no longer worked, he was being taken care of by others and felt alone, there was a lot of time to think.

This man had lived life by two principles. One was that a person must live in a manner that when he grows old and sits down to tell his story, it doesn't bore the children that listen. The other was that you must walk to the beat of your own drum. In fact, he had taken the last principle quite literally. This old man had started playing the drums, as a very young boy, at his father's side.

With so much experience behind him after 80 years of living, he would often reflect on the good times and not-so-good times by visiting the City of Memories in his mind s eye. It was an entire city made up of searchlights beaming toward the heavens in every color of the rainbow. Each one of these searchlights contained a memory of the old man's. Some were dimmer than others. The dimmer ones contained his most recent memories. The other searchlights, though, were intensely bright! That s because those memories had had many years to grow bright from the old man s childhood, his years as a young man, to the time he became a husband, father and elder.

One day, the old man went to visit the City of Memories. But this time he was having trouble finding the way to all those spectacular lights. He sensed the glow of the City, but couldn't see the intense beams of light. As he moved closer to where he knew the City to be, the glow grew dimmer and dimmer. Before he could get there, the glow disappeared. He could see nothing now. What had happened? Why were the lights beyond his grasp? How sad and lost he was.

Now, how would he ever recall the memories he had been able to reconnect with by visiting the City? Even though the number of searchlights he could see had grown fewer over the years, those he could still see gave him a sense of identity. Who was he now, without them? How could he ever not bore the children, if he sat down to tell his story to them? When by himself, he wept uncontrollably. He felt so unsettled and unhappy. How could he care for the image of the old man he wore like a suit, when he no longer knew who he was or what he had been. The only thing he could think of was that he needed a story to tell before it was too late. What was he to do? There were only two choices: do nothing or do something. He needed an adventure! That would tell him what he was made of and he'd collect some stories along the way.

"What could I do for an adventure," he asked himself.

From a place deep inside, he heard an unfamiliar, though kind, voice say, "Come to me."

At first, he wondered who was speaking because he was sitting on the porch all by himself. But it was such a pleasant-sounding voice, it didn't t matter. After being briefly distracted, he reminded himself of what he had heard the voice say, "To roam is to be free."

So he decided he would. Roaming would certainly be a good way to start the adventure he needed.

On a cool and cloudy early morning, as the sun was rising, he dressed and then walked out the door of the only home he had known for the last few years and down the street. In moments, someone pulled up in a small car and asked, "It looks like we could get a storm. Do you need a ride?"

The old man replied, "Sure, can you take me to Temperance?"

"Certainly, I'm going that direction myself." So, the old man took his place as a passenger in this kind person's car.

Within a few hours he was in Temperance. The old man remembered that he knew this place. It was as familiar to him as the City of Memories but for what reason it was familiar, he could not recall. In any case, it was a good day a good day to breathe, a good day to sit outside on a bench with sunshine drenching his face (since there were no clouds in the sky now), and a good day because he felt free. So, he found a bench, sat down and lit up his pipe. As he sat there, he asked himself what it was that kind voice had said to him. Oh yes, now he remembered. The voice had said, "Come away with me."

Shortly, someone pulled up along the street in front of the bench the old man was seated on and asked, "Can I give you a lift?"

The old man thought surely this was the person he was supposed to go away with. So, he said, "Sure, where are you going?"

"I m going home," said the driver.

"Where is home?" asked the old man.

"Home, is where my family is, which is in Breckenridge."

"Oh, I never heard of that place before, but it sounds fine to me!"

"Hop in, then."

The two, driver and old man, carried on a pleasant conversation all the way to Breckenridge. Three hours must have gone by. The driver asked the old man, "Where can I drop you off?"

The old man replied, "Oh anywhere, I suppose. Say, does this town have a bus station?"

"Yes, it does, and I'd be happy to stop there. It's on my way."

So, the old man was let off at the bus station in Breckenridge. He looked around at the neat pictures on the wall of the station and found a place to sit down. The old man enjoyed watching people going to and fro and wondered where they were all going in what seemed to be such a hurry. Then, from a place deep inside himself he heard a kind voice say, "Come to me."

He looked around at all the people passing by, but no one was looking at him as if they had just spoken to him. At that very instant, an incident happened at the station. A woman in line to board a bus fainted, probably from the heat and high humidity of the afternoon. This bothered the old man. So, he stood up and walked in the opposite direction of the commotion and out of the station. After getting far enough away, he recalled having been spoken to by a kind voice and tried to recall what it was the voice said. Oh yes, now he remembered. The voice had said, "Show the way to me."

The old man thought there was nothing more wonderful than to be needed by someone and to be able to show them around. So, he walked the town streets pointing to things in store windows explaining out loud to the voice that had spoken to him, the history of those things. The information came easily to him, and he never even wondered how or why he remembered it was like he had never forgotten.

When he reached the end of the store fronts on the main street of town, he tried to remember again what the kind voice had said. He looked around, hoping no one could tell that remembering was difficult for him. That was it! He immediately knew. The kind voice had said, "Use some money for tea."

That was a superb idea because as he was thirsty.

Looking back down the main street, he saw a sign that read, STEAMROOM—For Your Health. So, he went in and asked for some tea. But, he was informed by the staff that they didn't t have any. The old man thought this was dreadful, because he was certain the sign said they had "tea."

As he left, he looked at the sign again and right there, in plain sight, he saw tea between a couple of squiggly lines. What was this world coming to, the old man thought to himself. If this was how the world was now, he wasn't sure he wanted any part of it.

He was now very thirsty and hot, and it had been a long day. Even though dapperly dressed, in a suit and overcoat, it wasn't needed on this hot, sunny day. So, after taking his overcoat off and carefully folding it over his arm, wearily he moved on. He walked down several residential streets, then into an industrial area and beyond that into fields where the wildflowers were blooming. It looked like a scene out of Monet's garden.

The sun was now moving lower in the sky. The old man was parched and weak so much so that he forgot about being on an adventure. He didn't t see anything familiar now. But he could hear the birds singing and saw an occasional squirrel climbing a tree, and it tickled him with a delight he hadn't felt since childhood.

Suddenly, he wondered to himself again, "What was it that kind voice said to me earlier? Oh yes, it was Lie down with me."

So, he found a wonderful place where the trees danced with the setting sunlight. The old man rolled up his coat, the one he had taken off earlier and carried with him, and placed it on the ground to make a pillow. Next, he mustered what energy he had left and gathered all the leaves he could find on the ground nearby and made a mattress of them just below his rolled-up coat. Then he sat on the stump of a tree nearby and took off his shoes one-by-one and placed them next to the mattress of leaves. Lastly, as the sun set, he lay down on the ground in his makeshift bed and went to sleep.

The old man began to dream, but the dream seemed oddly real. He saw the most splendid and bright light, reminding him of the ones that had guided him to the City of Memories before he had lost his way. But this light was ever so much more spectacular! Then the kind voice, that the old man remembered hearing, spoke in a welcoming tone and said, "You found your way, and I am so glad you have finally come to me."

Postscript: The 83-year old father of this story's author was experiencing the early stages of Alzheimer s when he walked away from his home in June 1999. His remains were found ten months later in a wooded area where he had laid down to sleep within two miles of the home he left.