Thursday, April 3, 2014

Footprints

Last Thursday started like any other. A snooze button was pressed several times before getting out of bed, a small steaming cup of coffee was purchased from a corner cafe, errands were initiated, and a normal shift behind the bar where I work was completed.

However one week ago on this very day something wasn't the same. A spring to each step was lacking energy, drowsiness from the night before lingered a few hours longer than normal, and at the bar a series of spills left bandaged fingers as the victim of personal clumsiness. Besides the sharp sting from broken glass the only distinguishable feeling once last call was reached was that of slight internal vacancy. Something inside wasn't fully present.

An evening breeze swiped against my face a with slightly dissimilar velocity from nights prior as I hiked with heavy feet up the street to my house where my parents were also winding down from their own series of daily happenings.

Normally we would sit together and chat but tonight there only sat an urge to climb upstairs to my room and simply sleep away the oddness of the day's rhythm.

As I slowly climbed up into the blackness of my room a clanging of intense rattles from the blinds of a distant open window gave notice that the wind outside wasn't ceasing its rolling relentlessness. Instinctively reaching for the light-switch at the doorway to my room the attic style living quarters instantly illuminated and tints of soft yellows projected themselves along each corner. A slow sigh of relaxation whispered calmness into the room however within instants an eruption of hisses from the disturbed window shades brought an undesired liveliness.

The commotion was coming from an enclosed walk-in storage space to the side of my dresser that rarely was used. Stomping with urgency to shut the window I caught sight of something that brought a wave of nostalgia to my eyelids.

Buried beneath a bag of saved childhood mementos sat something that I laid to rest a long time ago. An item that shamefully had been left forgotten and grown dormant through lack of proper attention. It was the travel backpack that had served as my companion in last year's trip to South America and instantly a date in time rushed to the front of my recollections. March 27, 2013. This day in history marked a final series of tracks down south, a return home, and pivotal footprints forward towards a different chapter in life. That was precisely one year ago last Thursday.

One year ago on this day I promised this grey oversized partner of adventure, and myself for that matter, that there would soon arrive a day when we would ride again. The "see-you-soons" of last year now stung like fateful "good-byes" and "never-agains."

For 365 days a close friend had been left behind and merely glancing at a mirror could determine who was truly responsible. Reaching out to feel the scarred canvas of the backpack I slung it over my shoulders just to see if it still remembered who I was, to once again reminisce of how it felt to have it close again.

Standing in the blackness of this concealed storage room desperate murmurs from gusts of invisible air collided against the now fully locked window.

Tugging the harnesses closer together I could feel the rustling of a soup kitchen in Bogota, slightly releasing one cord the sensation of a Spanish classroom in Quito flickered then evaporated, bending slightly forward I caught a quick glimpse of a hiking shoe disappearing from a Peruvian collectivo, shaking both straps the sounds of cumbia music echoed from some unknown origin. The contents within this travel sack didn't feel like anything that important but then again they felt like everything that truly mattered.

The soles of my feet began to shudder and knees buckled like a horse taking on an obese rider. The travel pack was beginning to gain weight over my shoulders and it was practically unbearable. Hastily dropping it to the floor I curiously unzipped it's main compartment to see what was making it so dense.

Reaching my hand through its main compartment there was absolutely nothing inside. Not a single relic remained in its confines after a year in exile.

The wind outside vanished. The only disruption to this now ghostly silent room was the sound of my parent's downstairs television and a sinking from my heart. The internal off-beat flow of today matched the state of how I had left this once loyal companion: Utterly hollow.

In my heart I knew that foreign sunsets, unfrequented pathways, fine-printed passport stamps, and endless potential firsts and lasts awaited out in the world. It couldn't be done alone.

I extended an apologetic hand in greeting down to one of the shoulder straps and tugged the clumsy over sized backpack once again upon my shoulders. I didn't know if it would ever forgive me and be open to getting lost with me again but with a gentle nod I re-positioned it where it should have been all along: Next to my bed.

Before going to sleep a single piece of paper was torn out of a nearby notebook, a quick note was written, folded gently, then climactically tucked inside a compartment that had for 365 days grown withered with neglect. A ripped sheet of paper isn't much, but I swore to myself that my partner in wanderings would never sit empty again.

Turning off the lights to my bedroom the note read:

"September 2014, with Love and Footprints"

One week ago on a Thursday I received the best sleep I had gotten in a very long time, quite possibly a year.