A Touch with Infinity
Can a mere mortal lifespan ever touch the infinite, The Forever, the perspective of an expanse of existence with no end? LIke a meteor that travels through endless space, mindless, in random direction, traveling anywhere until suddenly... sentience.
Can traveling through endless space, where speculation of past lives, souls and the Akashic record, all tauntingly hint at infinity be knowable to everyone? Some individuals come to experience this Michelangelo-finger-touch only once in their lifetimes, while others experience it multiple times a day.
There is no way to measure or define a journey of conscious thought. There is only a fleeting feeling of frustration as your awareness pops back in, like you were momentarily out of body.
Is going out of body, out of time the mortal’s path to touch infinity? The slightest moment we stop paying attention, it happens and there’s a nano second of awareness before it vanishes. You try to measure, try to grasp it, know it, but then you miss the importance of the experience and still mortal, you fall short of infinity.
When I was eight years old, on a late Saturday morning in February, I escaped our family house, the boredom, the parental fighting, by going outside to play. Chucking on and buckling my black rubber boots, then hastily shoving my arms into my winter coat –leaving the zipper undone– I ran headlong through the front door, breaking free of the stifling atmosphere of my mother and father’s angry inattention.
The snow reflected a clear sky and sparkling white sun. The sudden crisp air in my lungs spurred me, made me run tearing down the block. It was an old suburb, less than a mile outside of a small town. Houses were efficient in size and set with room between properties. The snow was plowed to form bunker-like walls along the street, half hiding the bungalows behind. I watched the air escape my mouth, forming lingering puffs of frozen mist in front of my face as I ran.
I wasn't running anywhere, just running, that free, wanton running that only wild stallions and day dreaming children can do.
During a race with my imagination I threw myself into a stealth fantasy, stalking unknown dangerous criminals, pre-historic mammals, or supernatural boogiemen. I raced across neighbors’ lawns and tore between easements, finally in pure exhaustion I flopped down on a random patch of grass breaking through a melted section of snow. I laid there, chest heaving, my throat and lungs burning. The rest of the world and time itself stood still. My very first experience, while staring at high, sparse clouds, when I imagined I could feel the earth rotating beneath me.
Yellow morning sunlight warmed me and for a brief moment, it was summer. The ragged patch of grass I rested on was dry and green and warm, so out of place with the winter season. I clung to that patch, my fingers dug in, catching and holding my breath. At that very moment, as if I were cocooned, captured in amber to be released from this private sanctuary at the very moment I'd start breathing again, I felt time stop.
I felt no discomfort from the cold. I looked at the surrounding mounds of crystal-blued snow covering the neighbor's yard I serendipitously chose to lay in. It didn't matter to me anymore that it was winter, a season cold and wet and denying the coming of spring. I was immune to it's frozen clutches. My clumsy boots felt heavy on my feet. My coat was wide open and dropped off my shoulders. Sweat soaked my knit hat. My face burned hot in the high, morning sunlight. This was the instant, my first moment I knew without fully understanding – a glorious knowing– my private out-of-time feeling was a touch with infinity. A child’s realization I'd take with me the rest of my life.
#moment #prose fiction #childhood #touching infinity #short story #memories #william calkins #roarke
The Moment
They all say to live in the moment.
There is no 'the moment'.
It's all moments.
Endless minutes rolling on, and on, to make an hour, then a day, a week... a month... a year... a decade...
It's all time.
It always, connects, never slowing down, or speeding up for anything.
How can I live in a moment, or describe a single moment when it rolls into the next with no warning and no pause, and even if there was, that pause is time wasted.
Time... time... time... life... time... death... time...time...
Time is always there. It never stops. Even when you die, time keeps moving.
You and I
Everyone around us is sweaty. Not the normal kind of beaded-sweat-sweaty, the drenched and stinking sweaty–typical of a concert, really. The smell of weed permeates the air, fogging our senses. The deafening beat echoes throughout, the ground practically trembling. I’m not claustrophobic or anything; in fact, I love crowds. I just don’t like the prospect of going into one alone. But, I’m not alone. You’re with me and for some reason, you’ve been able to talk me into it.
We head into the crowd, you–always the leader–pushing forward into the first barrier of people. I sigh, peel my hair back from my sticky forehead and head in right behind you. All of a sudden, my oxygen cuts off. People around me are tall and imposing and oh-so-loud. I contemplate heading back out and I’m just about to turn to do so when you grab my hand.
I see this twinkle in your eye–you’re excited to be here, I can’t deny you that. You gesture with your head, nodding towards the stage as if to ask me, “You coming?” I would never say no to you so of course, I nod, gripping your hand minimally tighter.
That makes you smile. You give me your characteristic ‘you ready?’ look and I nod, “Just don’t let go.”
Your face splits open in a smile and you whisper–but for some reason, I can hear it louder than the bass and the screaming and the singing–“Never.”
The world freezes around us and in this moment, it’s you and I. Nothing around us moves; not the people, not the air and not a blade of grass. We are frozen in this moment, you and I–just two people who were going to be more in love than we could have imagined in that second. Your smile encompasses your face and that twinkle in your eye is brighter than the floodlights. You look at me like you’ll always have my back, like you’ll always take care of me. And I? I look at you as if I've already found some semblance of home. My usually stoic eyes melt away and they’re softer–the kind of soft they will only ever be around you.
What I will never forget is that in that moment, you gripped my hand like it was your lifeline but really, it was mine. What I will never think about though, is that in that moment, we’d already fallen in love. We may not have known it and we may not admit it now but when the sound of that barely-audible ‘never’ resonated through the arena, we’d sealed our fate in stone and promised each other that we would never, ever let go.
It’s a shame we did really, because I would bask in the glory of that moment for the rest of my life. Your cheeky smile and matted hair, shirt drooping slightly over your shoulders because you loathe tight-fitting clothes. My admiring eyes and sweaty palms. You and I. Always, you and I.
We hold on to different people now but that moment, that was everything.
A Brief Look at Regret
I noticed him shortly after we walked in the room. He stood out for some reason. He looked as if he didn't belong. He was a scrunny kid, wearing a mustard yellow sweater, rust colored jeans, and a fedora perched atop his mini fro. I thought him strange but docile. He sat away from the crowd but he watched intently. Had I known in that moment the devastation he would leave behind, I would've crushed him where he stood. That moment still holds regret. We were never the same.
All we need is confirmation, sometimes.
Majority of people would felt the same feeling, more so than myself would ever will. The feeling of when the skin of her hands linked with mine and both of us focused none other than the darkness in the skies. It's a shame there are no stars in the sky tonight, she would say whilst coming closer to my figure. I smiled, closing my mouth from uttering any word that would ruin the moment for the both of us. It's going to be the last time, I thought to myself, as I had the feeling in my guts.
I held her hands even more tightly than before. She noticed what I did, and turned to look at my haze brown eyes. I looked at her back at her sky blue eyes. Her lips were small and her nose was pointed. Her cheeks were plump and her eyebrows were thin. She had wavy black hair, with a single pink straind of hair. "I would never understand on how you fell in love with me. I'm not perfect, far from it. I'm not handsome, like all of your friends, and my friends. I'm not smart, I'm not creative, and my only talent are of writing articles around the fashion industry." My voice was quiet. I'm a failure, I thought.
She came closer to my body, resting her head on my shoulders and putting her hands around my body. Then, without any prior movement, she kissed me on my left cheeks. I couldn't react with anything, expect letting a single tear flowed from my right eye. She didn't say anything afterwards and the both of us held ourselves together even closer for the entire night.
That feeling of reassurance, I guess. I just hope that it would be the last time I had doubts about you. Sadly, most of us aren't that lucky. I could only hope that I could be lucky enough to be the lucky one.