I struck summer gold.
The countryside is a stretched-out blur behind the glass windows, but when the train doors open I see it all so clearly — and I wish that this was home instead.
Wide-open fields; rolling hills; orange groves; trees that sing to each other; a palette of slightly undersaturated yellows, golds, and greens that leave nothing untouched; a breeze that stays with you long after it’s gone — a warm, tingling breeze that wraps its arms and legs around you and pulls you down with it; a freedom that crawls inside your throat and plants itself there, urging you to disappear from what you know and those who know you. I could be someone here, I could be different here, I could come alive here.
It may be the unfamiliarity of a new place, or maybe the over-familiarity of an old place driving these feelings, but I’m itching to get out. And this might be the place.
Power lines cut through the view. Clouds tattooed gold by the sun hang low; I can almost reach them if I try.
I’ve always come alive near the mountains, under the sun, by the sea. Back home, I’m regenerative, in constant metamorphosis, killing parts of myself every day in hopes of coming alive. It would be nice to come alive and stay alive for good, even if for a minute.
The wind is howling below the horizon, almost imperceptibly, but I catch her in my palm and nudge her inside my ears. She wobbles at first, needing to adjust to me again (after all, it’s been a while), then starts swimming down my ear canals. She moves further into my body, trying to get to every corner as quickly as possible. Then, she starts vibrating inside of me like a steady drum beat. It’s starting, that feeling, that hunger.
She tells me, “Move, dance with me, run towards me, let me embrace you, I’ll love you better than they ever could. You’re mine, you’re cut from me, you’re cut from the sun, you’re cut from the moon, you’re all the planets poured into one big body. But you’re mine first so come to me. Be mine the way I’ve always been yours.”
She pulls me like a puppet off the train and towards the field; I’m her personal marionette doll and I don’t mind it one bit. I nearly drop my bags as I get outside the station. in one easy pull, she lifts my hands above my head. She doesn’t care about propriety, she only cares about the rush of being alive. She pulls my right leg outward like a kick and pushes down my torso as if she’s tackling me. She’s disorienting me in the name of exhilaration, euphoria. It’s been a while since I’ve felt either so I say hello.
“Feel it,” she whispers and wraps her hands around my neck. Her fingertips brush against my skin tantalizingly slow, starting in the center of my neck and moving outwards until all I can feel is the lingering remains of where she just was. I plant my feet firmly into the ground for a few final moments of groundedness before she takes over.
She knows, she remembers. I smile. Someone remembers me. I am someone’s memory. I am permanent to someone.
“Welcome back,” she says. “I’ve missed you.”
I start running — but not for long before she freezes, rather stops me, in place.
“Not yet.” she erects an invisible wall in front of me, stopping me in my tracks. “Dance first. Run later.”
So I start dancing again. It’s not pretty. It’s quite rough and uncoordinated. There’s no consistency. It’s awkward. I’m spinning on my feet and stretching and pushing my arms and legs away from my body, pirouetting as best I can which is actually not as bad as it could be. I’m moving my body like rain sliding down the orange trees, moving my body the way the stalks of wheat do when the wind tickles them during golden hour, moving my body like the clouds leisurely rolling across the hills, moving my body like nature does every day.
My hair is hitting my face, I’m breathless, I’m sweating through my shirt, my toes are digging into my sneakers, but I feel the most me that I have in a while so I cannot stop. I won’t.
Everything in the universe is moving through me. I’m no longer my body but a vessel for the wind, for nature to use as an extension of itself. The separation between my body and the rest of reality has disintegrated. Everything is everything.
“Now run,” she commands, lovingly, and pulls me towards the hills. I lunge forward, nearly tripping over my feet.
She’s at my feet, wrapping herself around my ankles. She’s at my neck, blowing my hair away from my face. She’s slinking underneath my shirt, up my stomach, spreading herself across my chest and rushing down my bare arms until she reaches my hands and holds them in her gentle grip. She’s my familiar embrace, the warmest embrace, the not-so-quiet friend of mine I’ve had since I was little.
I’m myself right now. I feel like myself more than I do most days. This is why I can never stay still. I was born to move, to dance, to run, and never stop. I’m running, feet hitting the grass in light thumps as if I’m running on clouds. The sun has enveloped everything in a golden glow. Time is at a standstill. Time is imperceptible. Time doesn’t exist here anymore.
The train doors close. I blink. I press my palm against the glass. She taps — once, twice, three times — against the glass. I smile at my reflection. She did it again.