But if he could leave it at that, then so could she.
“What are we to think? Life is a mystery. We seldom decipher the simplest equations. . . We read what we can.” He searched the ocean for signs of the storm’s intensity. A powerful emotion threatened his equilibrium. He did not wish to be lost in it.
“I think your dream was very beautiful,” he said at last, and there was something in his manner that seemed to dismiss the subject. His apparent lack of interest intrigued her further; she detected a certain decision in his silence, something akin to faith. Whatever the actual reality behind his behavior she was now determined to drop the subject, mystery or no mystery. In truth, what are we to think?
“What’s it like to be a poet,” she said for lack of anything else to say. She smiled and held up her open hands in a gesture of surrender to the subject. He laughed wearily. This was another question he’d hoped would not be asked. In the back of his mind he felt a strong sense of unreality.
“I’m really not a writer – but the most useless thing on earth: an aging man who once wished to be a writer.” He paused, then continued: “You know, it’s like dreaming I am dreaming . . . to be constantly awakened from a really great line or verse or a work in progress suddenly finished and doubtlessly perfect. Only to see the shadow of a shadow trailing behind one’s longing and words.”
“I don’t think it is useless work at all,” she said, with obvious sincerity.
“Like I said, I survive as best I can . . . my sister and I eke out a living with our shop. Then there’s my military pension and the occasional side job. Survival, as I’m sure you know. (and he looked at her with a strong, knowing look that made her feel uncomfortable, which was not easy to do) Survival is the key.”
“I don’t understand this world,” she commiserated. Strangely, it seemed as if she were talking to herself – her sympathy appeared general, directed not to anyone or anything in particular but merely requisite to the dilemma of living in an unsatisfactory world – a world which appreciated the utilitarian and the practical business of living, not the abstract, subjective and, let us face it, useless work of translating through ones’ brain the recondite sorcery of Art. Sure most of us hung a picture or two on our bare walls or entertained ourselves with a sentimental poem or short story; sometimes we even prided ourselves on knowing certain authors, their anecdotal record that proved just how special they had been. But, all in all, we related to those who were engaged in the daily ordinary struggles, which is our common admission into the human race. All else was merely indulgence. The same fears, greed, lust and ignorance that pulled us together – maintained the commonplace. Art was the last dish on the table – not any form of desert either, but at best an appetizer we could share in our likes or dislikes. Art, at its highest form, approached truth, spirituality, God: thus it was by nature anathema. We already possessed these things, in dog bone certainty. Therefore Art was another useless conundrum, intertwining, and representing by a pliable wire a hangman’s knot. One would be wise to keep one’s art to oneself. At least these were more or less Hector’s thoughts. Sara held tight to her intrinsic worth theory – the masses just didn’t get it. Life was too brief a journey to waste it merely on things. She was infected, as so many others, by the bug of knowledge. After all, we lived in a world of disharmony, deranged and twisted by the preoccupations of the time.
“Art, in its truest sense, is the art of living well; and when it comes to this – well, I can tell you without any false humility, that in this I am a miserable failure.” He threw a shell into the surf, glancing back at her as he did so, wearing a mischievous smile as if to say that none of it mattered anyway. The weight of the failure at the things he’d just said to her disgusted him (like a lie) – he couldn’t defend or explain art. The work was all that mattered.
“As for writing or any other medium,” he continued, pedantically, filled with self-loathing, “The work is a personal expression turned into a product, utterly subjective, made true only in so far as it reaches another. . . though I have often thought that maybe it is not quite as subjective as it seems. I mean, our stories, our work, belong to everyone precisely because they are stories, drawings, music, revealed to and about the exact same person – the exact person who is essentially a strange unknowable being for whom we can never get our fill.”
Here he paused and laughed, seemingly at himself. “Of course there are the commercial concerns – quality be damned! – the primary concern of making money. Once in awhile the two coincide. This, naturally, gravitates toward mass appeal, the watered down and easy, the easily accessible... Why? I’ll tell you. . . The purpose of Art is to awaken. And this reveals us to ourselves. And naturally this is painful! Simply put: People don’t want Art because it forces them to wake, and this waking hurts!”
“That’s probably true,” she said, impressed by the clarity of his thought, “but good work ought to be valued. . . One shouldn’t have to starve or sell their souls to the devil merely to survive, and a bare survival at that, to be free to create.”
“Well,” he laughed, “we’ll always have the sea . . . and the whales . . . and the storms to prove our beautiful insignificance.!” She too laughed and looking toward the dark, choppy waters, said: “Have you see the whales?”
“Not in this storm . . . but many times before. They are a hobby of mine. They always seem so happy . . . though they are moving farther from shore, no doubt because it’s safer to keep their distance.”
“So, really, why are you here?” She surprised him with this question – a man who believed he could never again be surprised by anything. That was the precise moment when he began to look at her differently. And to see her as a woman, a real woman.
“A new start,” he began shyly. “And this is the closest thing to home I’ve ever known – though I admit that I am still looking.” Then he paused, as if he had more to say. “Something real, I suppose – but don’t ask me to describe this thing to you.” This was the first time he had admitted this to himself or others.
She looked down at the sand. An uneasy silence ensued, the sea washing its dead in the living waters, hand over hand.
“It’s been nice talking to you,” she said, and held out her hand. “My name is Sara. I would be interested in seeing your work.” He shook her hand and smiled.
“You have already seen it,” he said, without forethought. “I would be interested in seeing you. Remember, you are your work. I too am my work. And as you can see. . . Well, there’s not much to see in that department.” He laughed alone this time, while she kept a steady, enigmatic gaze upon him.
“Forgive me,” he laughed softly. “My name is Hector – I have no idea why I talk like that. No disrespect intended!”
“I must go,” she said cheerfully, ignoring his strange confession, and started walking away. “Good luck, Hector.” She turned, smiling, in a full moving circle, swinging her arms. “And keep writing – if only for me.”
The turquoise sea was pulling back into itself, the cool wild breezes quickening, the air charged with a subtle, incipient restlessness. How far can one go? He was looking toward Panama; perhaps as far as Tierra del Fuego or Brazil, or perhaps even beyond, round the Cape of Good Hope and the Indian sea. Perhaps as far as Conrad’s Malaysia, toward islands of new beginnings among people who had never known the consciousness of sin. Perhaps he might yet find a place to begin anew.
“No,” he admitted, sadly, “this is my place.” But a lingering doubt itched, as it were, his very soul. How far can one go? Suddenly he turned and sprinted down the beach.
‘Wait,” he called loudly,
