Feeling Something, Somewhere Else

Dear Friend,

If you were to ask me why I chanced to visit the Bay this past weekend, I would have told you that I had signed up for the Monterey Half Marathon. If you chose to follow up with any one of the following: 1) I didn't know you've been running! (astonished, genuine), 2) how was the marathon? (conversational, unassuming), or 3) you didn’t actually run, did you? (skeptical, rude), I would have responded with: 1) I didn't know either! (I haven't), 2) it was lovely! (a lie), and 3): the real marathon was the friends we made along the way (plagiarized).

I would have also shared that I did, in fact, spend the day of the race down in Monterey. We — three close friends and I — made the two-hour drive down from Mountain View in the late morning as the Marathon came to an end. We traveled first to Cannery Row, for lunch and the beach and a tour of the storefronts, then looped South through Carmel, into the Highlands, and towards Big Sur.

I would have described to you how breathtaking that drive was.

How, from Monterey, we drove first into a grove of cypress trees cloaked in mist, where the world was bathed in a sepia-toned grey, where the sun was so diffuse that it seemed to shine from everywhere and nowhere, all at once.

How, from the grove, we drove through a shrouded valley where the sun could not hold court, where all was silent but for the chorus of the waves beneath, where all was still, even the trees, as though the world held its breath for a performance.

How, from the valley, we drove up the winding roads, across old concrete bridges floating just above the boiling grey, and into the mountains, until, at last, we pulled out into a small gravel lot just off the freeway.

I would have described to you the feeling of stepping out the car and into a painting. Before us, an endless sea of clouds, reaching towards the horizon, and the sun, with its brilliant halo, bathing the world gold in its splendor. I would have shown you a photo taken in that brief moment before sunset, when all is gilded, timeless, perfect. But, pause just a little longer, until I melt from elation and back into reality, and I would’ve also described to you a strange sense of longing, a feeling I could not, cannot place.

It is a feeling that I may only describe as feeling something, somewhere else.

Let us return from that wayward conditional space. Do you feel it too? It is a feeling more measured than the desperation of remembering a parted memory, less certain than the afterglow of wistful nostalgia. It is a feeling too self-aware of the absence it creates, yet too stubborn to surrender itself to fill that void. It is a feeling of suspension that lives in the space between time, in the time between space, at the waist of the hourglass. It is fleeting, for, just a moment later, it shall slip into freefall and melt into memory.

We drive back up from Monterey as the sun dips beneath the clouds. Back, down the mountain, and onto the freeway once again. It is a familiar drive, one that I have made so many times before, each time warmed by the same joyful afterglow. The last hues of sunset burn in the side mirrors as I steer North from the Highlands. The last light of day vanishes as we pass into the shadow of the Santa Cruz mountains. The car is quiet, or at least, that's how I remember it, for I know we never stopped rotating through our playlists.

It is the feeling of practicing the story you’ll tell, even as it’s unfolding around you.

We are trapped into traffic, four lanes deep, as we near San Jose. Strangely enough, I do not mind. It feels right, as though the body knows, from experience, that no adventure in the Bay should be complete without a forced moment of glacial meditation. We inch forth, bit by bit, until the route on my phone updates. Off the highway, we drive, and into the side streets, where all is dark but for the two pale beams that light the way, and the faint glow of the Prius console just behind the wheel.

It is the feeling of losing someone dear, even as you're holding them in your arms.

We trace the blue line on the map and it brings us back onto the 101. Past San Jose, and the road widens, four lanes become six, and suddenly we're racing up in the carpool lane. Streetlights dissolve into streaks as the highway signs flash by before us. Santa Clara. Sunnyvale. Mountain View. And then, at last, we've returned. The story ends. We bow, the world bursts into applause, the curtains close, and we take leave of the stage.

It is the feeling of forgetting, even as you're writing it all down.

Forevermore, Eden