The Purse

SUBHEAD: It started with what might be called a careless accident.

By Tom Teitge on 9 February 2009 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2009/02/purse.html)


Image above: "Lovers" by Zhang Yaxi from http://www.zhangyaxi.com.cn/en/sculpture_portfolio/Lover/


He lay basking in the warm afterglow of their lovemaking; and gazed across at her chaotic hair on the pillow. He'd had many women before this; his background: the heady financial district, quick relationships, high flights of luxury, the promise of ever fulfilled dreams; and then, the flowering into yet another gray and dreary Monday. She was a different breed; no high price hair cut, no tailored garments.

She was of an earthier vein. Her aspirations of prosperity were rooted in the real soil of the earth, not in abstract financial strategy.

She had a grace, a glamor even, that could not be bought at even the most exclusive of establishments. Nor could it even be embellished. It shone through, raw and naked. She talked little of her past.

She was evasive and laughed away attempts to ferret out historic details.

His thoughts wandered back to when he had first seen her; and how lovely she had looked in the downtown soft evening light. She looked vaguely out of place in the district. How had she even found a parking place?

She had stepped out of an older vehicle. Even the color of its paint was somehow foreign to the surroundings here. The contents of her purse had spilled across the sidewalk. He stopped abruptly in his stride and she looked up, and their eyes met.

There was a slightly bemused smile; a slight raising of the eyebrows, as if to unapologetically say, "Well, there you have it!".

And from that moment, he was caught. They spoke. She laughed at herself. He had on a nice suit, and expensive polished shoes. She was open to him; but hardly charmed; just open and just barely. He made the moves. He was the acquiescent one. "Could I help you?", he begged.

She could have said no; but, she would not have taken the trouble to say no; and so, this was how it all started. From that moment, he thought only of her. He sought to know her better; and slowly the relationship evolved. That was the turn in the road of his life.

Now three years later, the same purse reclined in the corner of their small bedroom, resting on a chair. How happy he had been in the peace of their lives together. He had no regrets; for all he had given up for her. In retrospect, his life, with all its enviable success, had been a mad-house of confusion.

The modest home, they now shared, was the antithesis of the elegance of his former area in the city. To the alarm of his high-rolling colleagues, he had effectively burned all the bridges, of his carefully constructed career. She, and the quiet countryside, and their simple home, had become his whole world.

And, though the loss, or rejection of his former world had come at a price, he seldom looked back. Their lives were bounded by the work they shared and found fulfilling.

At times, it still amazed him, that he had chosen a path so divergent from some previously established formula of desire; all of what he, and those around him, had aspired to.

His former friends could barely cloak their disapproval, their disbelief, and when confronted by this he became momentarily confused himself. But she made it all clear. Without a word, it was she that made it all clear: a new set of values, a new perspective, a parallel universe in which, yes, sometimes he panicked briefly with doubt.

But, then, there she would be. They cultivated various medicinal herbs, and sold them to a distributor. The money kept them going. Comfortably, by all measures, they led a healthy life, really. They kept a vegetable garden, as well, and she taught him cooking; simple, yet delicious.

Now when his old friends came to visit, there was less and less in common. And they did not care when these visitors ceased to come. He had long since sold his Mercedes, and now drove an older Chevy pickup.

And she had mentioned that the style of her old purse had a classic enduring quality, one which she was happy not to replace. She had an elegance all of her own; a richness, a true value.

When she smiled and broke into laughter, there was no affectation; just a plain and simple joy; but this was accompanied with a private distance, an unstated understanding of something. What?

When he tried to break down her invisible barriers, she responded with a quiet smile, a distant look, a slightly whimsical shake of her head. It occurred to him that his happiness was too perfect, and he looked with fear at any change that might disturb their lives.

She rose from the bed, pulled a brush from the purse, and carelessly moved her hair back from her face. She did not hide her nakedness. Instead she wore it with no thought.

Yet, simultaneously, she appeared the perfect picture of modesty. She turned to see the sun setting through the window. And as she did, she saw dust rising from their long dirt drive. She could see a car approaching. He rose and pulled on clothes.

At first, she stared for an unusually long moment. Something was changing. A cloud drifted across the sun. In their time together, he had learned something of her past; her life without him, before him.

he never dwelled on it. But there had been past love, past passion, and with someone of her type, how could it ever be past?

Tears began to well in her eyes. And she shuddered slightly, as she quickly dressed. He looked at her with alarm. She turned and faced him.

And with the quietest voice imaginable, said, simply, explaining the universe in a grain of sand: "You knew he'd be back.".

Intricate spider webs of longing and commitment, of obligations and loyalties, and of hopes and desires, stretched and crisscrossed backwards, through the years. And though it was unspoken, they both knew, even in that instant, that she would return to a former life. He had been transformed from his previous life. He had found a better way.

She had been his epiphany. She had been his compass star. There was something of his new life that could exist independent of her; the new perspectives, the new values; they could remain; in fact, would remain. She had laughingly told him once, half joking, that enlightenment was a one way street. It climbed upward. It did not descend.

He had followed her, and now, she would return to a past; a life that had fallen from her years ago; like a purse spilling onto the sidewalk, scattering all things randomly.

In that moment, as he stood next to the bed, with its scattered sheets, and as she descended the stairs; he saw, in a flash, that the spilled purse, the very miracle that had transformed his life; had been, but a careless accident.

• Tom Teitge, and artist, and a former resident of Hanapepe, Kauai, who now lives in Haley, Idaho.

1 comment :

Anonymous said...

tom - you write good
jj

Post a Comment