DRIVING BLIND

To begin with, I attended a party consisting of beer, wine, fondue, and a very large bonfire fueled by 120 dead Christmas trees. I ate too much calamari, toasted garlic,and salami, and felt bloated. My jacket smelled strange and my legs were hot.

So I'm driving through a blizzard now on slick roads and I can't see through my windshield.

I'm on my way home.

The cell-phone vibrates between my legs and I don't look at it because I'm too busy fumbling with the broken clicker-wheel on my iPod. Between the snow and sudden oh-shit appearance of three Elk staggering alongside the road, I give up and shuffle the bitch.

It makes that garbled shuffling noise and I'm bumping Lauren Hill, the opening lyrics of—

"You're just too good to be true

Can't take my eyes off of you

You be like heaven to touch

I wanna hold you so much

At long last love has arrived

And I thank God I'm alive

You're just too good to be true

Can't take my eyes off of you"

I'm reminded of The Deer Hunter, as always, and of the woman who used to sing those lyrics so softly, in a whisper, during our time together, deeply in love.

Frankie Valli sang the original.

I've always liked Lauren Hill's rendition better.

Next up: Have a Cigar, Pink Floyd's haunting and unbelievably rad track from their excellent 1975 album, Wish You Were Here, howling through my speakers.

It's moody and fitting as my wipers continually miss the patch of ice obstructing my vision.

I'm forced to crouch, leaning forward, squinting.

Snowball-size so-called flakes assail my windshield like a swarm of something angry, relentless, invincible.

The guitars fade, wailing to an odd finish, and Rock With You thumps into play, smooth as only MJ can be. I consider the darkness on either side of me: the cold blanketed mountains, frozen river, and dormant trees, brittle, snow covered and glistening.

Eight days till 80 degrees and sun, fun fun, wearing deck shoes or Clarks, warm in shorts with jean-jacket and satchel at hip, so ready to dip toes in sand.

I'm pushing 50 mph, rim-deep, and all of the sudden I can't get there fast enough, yet I also feel a certain strange sadness for what is being left behind. The mood of the moment, enhanced by whatever music, played while moving, unsteady, unsure—but onward.

Seems like either some knucklehead is telling us "it's always darkest before the dawn" and to "look to the future" or we ourselves become "trapped in the past" while wisdom suggests we disregard both [future and past] to focus on the present.

Driving blind—not to mention bloated, I realized how necessary all three perspectives are for our lives. There is no "past, present, or future", there is only one element, and that is LIFE. It was a subject I had briefly expressed only days before to a close friend of mine. The past created the present, the present will create the future, the future is why we fight, and we fight to enjoy life—right?

The three are integral and entirely necessary—they make up an individual life.

Looking at the past I can see the value that came from what was once my present, and before that, my future.

The present is spontaneous, unpredictable, and constantly testing our strength, strengthening us.

And the future is a goal we never reach, or appreciate, until it becomes our past.

Suffice to say, I made it home and slept.