Time Traveling
Awake and crying again. Won't it ever stop? I am terrified. Terrified of growing older, and terrified of staying young. I see myself at ninety-five; my family and friends are gone. I haunt my kitchen eating crackers and pills. I am doubled over and each second draws me nearer to death. No one knows this except the doctors and me. The truth being that no one cares except the insurance company and me.
Another flash and I am a young girl in college. Now I am only twenty years old. I see people from my journalism class around me. A couple of other girls , with the sort of make-up you have to take off with a chisel, drink beers and complain about their weight. Several of the "guys" from class also drink beers. They talk about how beautiful some new red haired girl looked at the bar the other night. I sit in the corner, knees against my chest, smoking a cigarette. I watch the others, and I am bored out of my mind.
Another flash and I am back in high school. I realize my age. Nothing to worry about, yet . . . Well, perhaps there is nothing to worry about. My life is still nice and tedious. I wake up in the morning, dress, brush my teeth, and go to school. There is no time to eat breakfast. As soon as I get out of school, I go straight to work, and after that I do my homework until two o'clock in the morning. Then I go back to bed.
I begin to wonder what my grandmother's life was like at my age. I often think about what life must have been like in the late forties and early fifties. I wonder what the world was like with the war going on. I walk down the stairs into my basement. "I need a break anyway," I say to myself.
At the base of the stairs, I see the box in which I keep all of my photographs. I rummage through the pictures seeking those my grandparents gave to me. I find the photos that my grandmother sent to my grandfather to keep his spirits up during the war. As I look through the many pictures, I notice a slight movement from the corner of my eye. It is a picture of my grandmother sitting on a fence post in a polka-dot dress. She was such a beautiful woman. "Odd," I say. "How did that get there?"
Looking a little closer at that photo, I realize my grandmother's dress is trembling in the breeze. The trees in the back ground seem to shudder as well. Then, my grandmother reaches out her hand. I jump back with a start. Her smile grows and seemingly stretches from ear to ear. "Darcy, you haven't forgotten me," the voice elderly and shaking as I had remembered it, defying the youthful face. "Won't you come visit?"
Scared out of my mind, my reply, too, is in a shaky voice, "H-h-h-h-ow can I?"
"Take my hand," she says. "Everything will be alright. I promise you at least this much. I will have you home before your mom knows you're gone."
Holding my breath, I reach out placing my index finger on Grandmother's out-stretched hand. What a strange sensation. I can feel the gloss of the photo surrounding me as I am pulled through it into another world. Pulled by a hand with red nails where only the very tips are painted white. When I reach the other side, my grandmother is still sitting on the fence, but everything is in color! The immense trees are green, her dress is red and white, and the fence is a sun faded brown! A cool breeze swirls around me and birds begin to chirp wildly. I recognize the smell of salt in the air immediately. Late August near the coast. It has to be . . .
The pastel houses around me are spread apart with lawns and white picket fences. There are flowers planted in front of, nearly, every door step. A man in a white suit hops from his cart to place milk bottles on doorsteps. The lady stooping to pick these up is wearing a pearl necklace. Her hair is short and curly. Her lips are red, and her hands, daintily manicured. Two women stroll by wearing hats and dresses. They carry decorative hat boxes and bags marked "Sear & Roebuck" in small white gloved hands.
"I've missed you so much! Thank you for coming to visit. Why don't you come with me to see Buster? I'll show you the new house." Her voice is now rich and full of energetic youth.
I hear a voice in the distance and I realize that it is my grandfather, Buster or Paw as my grandmother, Mary, likes to call him. I run as fast as I can to chase the sound. I see him standing beside his brand new, bright red, 1948 convertible. "Mary," he shouts. "Is that Darcy? How'd she get here?"
"She came back to visit us Buster! Just when we thought she'd forgotten all about us."
My grandmother wears her dark hair short with tight curls, her dress falls just below the knee, and her lips are bright red. My grandmother's wardrobe and hour-glass figure remind me of Marilyn Monroe or Betty Grable. My grandfather's blonde hair is slicked back with just a slight wave. He wears a light colored, short sleeve, Oxford style shirt and khaki pants.
"Darcy, do you want to meet my friend from the Philippines? We call him, ‘Rocket.'" At this a small brown hand reaches over the steering wheel of my grandfather's new car and waves. Two ears come next. Then the creature, no taller than my knee, leaps onto the dashboard and begins to dance around a bit. "Rocket, Darcy. Darcy, Rocket," goes the introduction to the small monkey.
"Let's go inside for some tea," my grandmother suggests. Gathering Rocket in his arms, my grandfather follows the two of us into the kitchen. As Paw sits at the table, my grandmother shouts, "ROBERT LEE DITTBENNER! YOU PUT THAT THING AWAY BEFORE HE CAUSES A FUSS!"
"Yes Miss Mary," Paw teases. Obeying, he walks up the stairs to lock Rocket into the attic. At this point, a wild commotion arises, and banging noises can be heard. "Rocket, you stop that!" The din continues a little more before my grandfather comes back to the table. Before sitting, he walks to the record player and selects his favorite Dorsey Brothers album. As it plays, a giddy swing beat parades through the house.
"Buster, you're a nut," my grandmother says as he begins a crossover Charleston. One wink with the old baby blues, however, and my grandmother swoons. She hops up, grabs his hands, and the two are dancing all over the kitchen's wooden floor. I really can't blame her. If there ever was a man with more brilliant blue eyes than my grandfather, I have never met him.
My grandmother's carefully pinned hair falls, revealing it to be a little more lengthy than expected. Both dance partners have lost their shoes (so as not to scuff the floor) and are dancing more rhythmically and knowingly than anyone of my own generation. Their smiles are so wide and feet so graceful, it seems as though I am seeing a faint apparition projected on a three dimensional movie screen. A few songs later, the two plop, sweating, into their seats at the table.
As I pour the tea over a few ice cubes into the pitcher, Mary and Buster, seeming more like Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire, laugh until their sides hurt. I can't refrain from asking, "Why don't y'all come with me for a little while and teach my generation how to dance?"
My grandparents laugh again as I serve the tea and sugar. I feel light hearted and glad to see the two of them again. As we chat, my grandmother suggests that we go down to the beach for a stroll. After tea, we jump into Paw's convertible passing miles of forest on narrow dirt roads. "Where are we?" I am thoroughly confused at this point. I know I am in Daytona Beach, but there is absolutely nothing around me. There are trees, sky, and dust flying around from beneath the tires.
We make several turns onto various dirt roads, and eventually come to a small pastel green house adorned with a seahorse. My grandmother tells me to go knock on the door. Upon doing so, a small woman in her mid forties answers. She wears a loose dress with a white collar. Her hair is short and curly. "Darcy? My how you've grown! You look just like your momma, you know that? Are you taller than me now?"
"Yessum, aint Kie," I giggle as I wrap my arms around her. "Do you want to go to the beach with us today?"
"Why I'd jest love to. Let me git my gloves real quick. Do you want a Coca-Cola?"
"No ma'am. I'll just wait in the car with those two," pointing towards the car. My grandfather's aunt gives a little wave then scurries into the house to get her belongings. I walk back out to the car and hop over the side into the back seat. My grandfather chuckles a bit and honks the horn to hurry Kie along.
"I swear, Mary, that woman takes longer to get ready with every passing day," Paw laughs at his comment and begins to whistle some tune I don't know the name of. He always was a whistler. Some people say that singing or whistling during the day means a person is happy. I believe that.
Eventually, Kie comes out of the house and makes her way to the car. My grandfather hops out and opens the door for her. My grandmother jumps into the back seat with me, and the four of us take off in a cloud of dust.
"We're almost at the beach," my grandmother shouts against the rushing air. It has only been ten minutes or so, but I am anxious to see the water. I can't wait to see Daytona Beach before it becomes a tourist trap with high prices and traffic jams.
"Where are the hotels?" I am screaming to make myself heard above the wind. I am also confused. Everything that I had ever known of Daytona Beach involved tourists and tacky hotels. Now there is nothing of that nature. A few palm trees, some oak, pine, weeds, and a few scattered flowers are strewn along the roadside. I see no familiar land marks or roads. When we reach the Daytona Beach island, I find only one bridge as opposed to the modern day six. There is also only one small marina as opposed to the dozens in a 1999 Daytona.
When we reach the beach, I am amazed. There are no tolls to pay for entering with a car. Several bonfires can be seen in the distance, and there are seagulls instead of pigeons. Shells line the shore here, and the sands are still a bit red from broken shells. It is late afternoon, and the beach is practically deserted. The few girls that are there certainly are not wearing the skimpy bikinis I am accustomed to. The boys wear shorts with a much tighter fit than anything I have ever seen on this beach.
The four of us all take off our shoes, leaving them in the car. My grandfather and I roll up our pant legs. Kie opens her purse and pulls out a bag containing several slices of bread. A small seagull, standing near by immediately waddles over to the first tossed crumb. Soon, there is a frenzy of feathers and webbed feet. When Kie runs out of bread, the riot dies down, and we continue our walk. After an hour or two of collecting seashells and splashing around in the water, we decide that it is time to go home. We walk back to the car and shake the sand off of our feet.
After leaving Kie at her own home, my grandparents and I return to their house. When we walk inside, Rocket is jumping up and down on the living room couch. My grandmother lets out a blood curdling scream followed by another, "ROBERT LEE DITTBENNER! YOU STOP HIM! He got my silk hose again."
Looking at the small brown figure, I noticed a pair of shredded panty hose pulled over his head. Rocket's eyes aglow with mischievous merriment, he hops onto my grandmother and begins pulling her hair. At this point, my grandfather intervenes, but not before another scream on my grandmother's behalf. "Rocket! Just what do you think you're doing?" my grandfather mutters in a baby voice. "You don't do that to Miss Mary. You know better. She won't let me keep you. You say you're sorry."
My grandmother then rushes to the bathroom to fix her dress and not let Paw see her cry. When she comes out, she tells my grandfather to buy more toilet paper. Rocket had unrolled all of it while we were away.
"I think it's time for me to go home now," I state as I hear a whispery voice calling my name. "Mom is looking for me."
"Alright, let me get Mary. We'll show you how to get back." Paw goes to fetch my grandmother. When she is done crying, the two lead me back to the fence. We all give each other hugs and kisses to say goodbye. I shake Rocket's little hand and tell him that it was nice to meet him.
"You step up on that fence and jump off. By the time you hit the ground, you'll be home."
Climbing onto the fence, I say goodbye one last time. Waving my hand I jump as high and as far as I possibly can . . . Suddenly, I am back in my basement looking at the photographs again. The picture of my grand mother on the fence is in my hand, and she waves to me as her movements die away and everything is still again.
"Yes, Mom?"
-Midnighte
