The Whale

Yesterday, I watched a video of a neuroscientist who became the subject of her own experiment, after she had suffered a massive stroke in the left lobe of her brain. It took many years for her right lobe to repair her left lobe. The source of her oneness with the universe restored the source of her structure and identity, that’s how she put it. She used her connection to the present moment, because she had no other choice.

We can all choose to live in the moment, right over left. I can choose to live in the moment. I can choose to write in the moment, even as I construct each moment on the page. Only, I’m stuck on the left. I can’t let go of me. I hold on to the story, I hold on to my story, I grasp at my ego. I smell the fear.

I’ve been working on a short story for a year. It’s a whale, it’s huge — it’s the story of my first full-on love with a man, back in in my early twenties, back in my political days. It wasn’t much of an affair, really. I can’t even recall his name. But the images are so vivid, so iconic. The moments are so powerful. I’ve written down all the scenes, each in sequence, a pile of pages, you’ve heard me read some of it. But still, I can’t end it after all this time. I’m not happy with it, there’s something wrong, something missing. I’m tormented by the mysterious hardwiring of my own love and desire. I’m trapped by a quest for meaning. I’m at sea and I’ve lost my compass. Just me and the whale and the vast, vast sea.

“You are driving me crazy,” I say out loud. “I can’t even remember your name, and still, you are driving me crazy.”

I look up from the computer monitor. His his face is right there, still young and pink and fuzzy, hasn’t aged a day. His blue eyes shine like I remember them the first time, his golden curls tumbling over the denim shirt I remember from that night at the anti-war meeting in the red brick church. My study feels strange, as if it weren’t the comfy room where I write every day. Surely it’s the light that’s tricking me, the pale rainy day that seeps in through the shutters. My fingers are pecking away at the black keys, typing is second nature to me. I never look at my fingers, only at the screen, at each letter, each word as it accumulates before me.

“You fell in love, that’s all.” I look up and see him smile. It’s a sweet smile, not lascivious, like I remember, like all the scenes I’ve written for him, a wise-beyond-its-years smile.

“People fall in love, that’s what trains our hearts,” he says.

“I know,” I say, “But, I’ll never feel like that again. It’s too late.”

“Perhaps. Only… you made me up. You know that, don’t you? You made it all up.”

“No, no, you were real, it really happened,” I say. I feel my throat tighten, but I go on. “Our amazing sex … all of the feelings … and, I left Patsy for you … only, you … you didn’t want me… And then, I’ll never forget how it all ended, you and me in that bar a year later.”

“I know the story, I know. But, what you call love — that’s what you made up.”

“No! Oh, no you don’t, you don’t get to do that to me! That love was real, it changed me, I know this, absolutely. It has to mean something.”

“Maybe,” he said, “Unless you choose to let go and see what happens.”

“I can’t do that. I don’t know why. Shit, I can’t figure this out.”

“You did it with your father, didn’t you?” he says, smiling again. The room is very hot, even without the sun. I can feel myself sweating.

“You’re not my father, don’t do that, don’t say that.”

“You made that up, too,” he said, touching my hand on the keyboard, gently swiveling my body towards him.

“Your brain has made up all these stories. The stories that surround the moments. Don’t you know, it’s the moment that’s important, not the stories. It’s the moment that’s important, not the meaning. The stories are holding you back.”

“No, that’s not true. The stories are me, my life, it’s all about stories. This is why I wanted to be a writer.”

“Is it? Then why did it take you so long, if it was so important?”

I sat in the chair holding his hand. I couldn’t say anything, gagged, bound, tied up, unable to move, unable to speak.

“Should I tell you? Or can you write it yourself?”

The texture of his hand is rough, like a construction worker’s. I hold onto it, I don’t know for how long, except that the light from the window seems to have brightened. Perhaps the sun is coming out after all. I pull away from him and return my fingers to the keys. I start to type:

Every love is a whale, it must be conquered, it must be killed, or it will kill you.