A Season of Uncertainties
The snow begins to fall in thick, wet flakes, and I clench the steering wheel, preparing for a tug of war with the Interstate. If there was a sun today, it went down long ago. The asphalt has grown slick, the steady stream of salt and nubby tires leaving a trail of slush that freezes over almost instantly in the dark.
I do not know how to drive in this. I do not know why I am still here, except that love has kept me longer than I intended. I also do not know how to skate, and we have promised the children that tomorrow we will take them to the pond where the older kids play hockey every afternoon during this five-month siege called winter. Back home, all winter means is that the rain comes more often and the hills turn bright green for two months. No wonder so many of our neighbors flee to Florida for Christmas, bidding us farewell until May.
The radio is on, but I am not listening. My attention is on the road and the steering wheel. A semi blasts by, throwing up a frigid wake that blinds me for the hour it seems to take to pass by. The tailwind pushes my car into the sludge between the lanes, and I can feel my tires begin to lose their way. I hold tighter to the steering wheel, try to regain some semblance of control. My left arm begins to ache, and I wrack my brain to remember the seven warning signs of a heart attack. I pray no other car will hit me when I slide, but I do not close my eyes; I want to remember every detail before death, as though there will be someone somewhere I should tell.
And then, as if by magic, my tires reconnect with solid pavement. I am back in my lane as though nothing happened, except that my heart is beating double-time and my hands have soaked the inside of my gloves. In the wet hum that follows, the radio plays on, a perfectly modulated male voice talking so calmly about some horrible crisis on the other side of the world that I want to turn it off, or at least turn it down, but that would require letting go of the steering wheel. As I struggle to convince my right hand that this is okay, that nothing catastrophic will come of it, a woman with a voice unlike any I have heard before begins to speak.
"Each morning I wake to the sound of gunfire and the cries of my sister's baby," she says softly. "It is 392 days today. We do not know what will happen next. Will they ever run out of bullets or bombs?"
My hand reaches to turn up the volume.
"My husband, he is Shiite. I am Sunni. What does it matter? We are married a long time. They burned our store so we have no work. The teachers are gone so for our children there is no school. Many people have disappeared. We do not know where they have gone or if they will return."
She sighs, and in the background there is the sound of the world exploding. "Perhaps there is a peace somewhere, but here there is only fighting now. We have no winter, no summer, no fall—here there is only the season of war."
Someone else begins to speak, that annoyingly calm male voice summing it all up in neat, numerical terms. Another truck passes by, this time more gently, and I absently count the seconds until it is gone—one-thousand-one, one-thousand-two, one-thousand-three—all the while thinking of the woman on the radio who spends her nights counting mortar shells instead of sheep. What color is her hair, her eyes, her skin? How does she live, eat, breathe? Is there anyplace for her children to play? Do they even remember how?
For God's sake why don't they just leave?
As I near town, the lights along the highway blaze peachy-pink, making me squint. Massive orange trucks blink red-yellow-blue next to state troopers idling in the snow, enveloped in white clouds of exhaust. My exit finally appears, and I guide the car carefully down the ramp, tapping the brakes lightly as David has taught me, easing up to all the stop signs, slowing well before each turn. The last mile takes much longer than it would if the roads were dry, but finally I am turning into the driveway, shutting off the engine, gathering up my briefcase, and walking up the stairs into the warmth of the kitchen, into the lovely noise of the children.
David greets me with a hug. I whisper, "One of these days I'm going to quit that lousy-ass job." He laughs but with some hesitation. He hates that I have to work so late so often, even the night before our wedding, and he worries that I drive so far each day, into another city, another state. "Maybe next week I'll get caught in the crossfire of some terrorist attack," I say, unzipping my coat. "And why does it only snow on weekdays?"
This is not the first time I have said these things. He pours me a glass of wine, and we sit down to platefuls of fried chicken and frozen peas and fluffy mashed potatoes. After dinner and dessert and an hour of TV, he puts the children to bed. I curl up with a down comforter and a novel I suddenly notice has 392 pages. Later, as I brush my teeth, I consider telling him about the woman on the radio, asking him what he knows about this war on the other side of the world. But the moment we crawl into bed, he wraps himself around me, buries his face in my neck and nibbles at my ear until I have goose bumps but whisper "Please, honey, tomorrow?" He sighs and turns out the light, making do with a single breast cupped in a calloused hand.
We wake early the next morning, the children a blur of motion and noise as though it were Christmas. David leans against the kitchen counter with a cup of coffee and a tolerant smile until they go too far. He yells that they had better keep their hands to themselves and finish their breakfast or there will be no ice skating today—a glimmer of hope, as far as I am concerned. But after a quieter second round of pancakes, we bundle up and trudge across the road to the pond, skates thrown over our shoulders like old pros, even mine, although the stiff, borrowed leather is awkward in my hands and I am sure they will not fit properly.
I cannot do this, I want to tell them. The one time I tried—in a rink back home where it never snows—my ankles kept buckling and I hugged the railing for two hours before giving up. But the children—his children, so young they scare me, make me wonder constantly what I should say and do next—are tugging on my coat and jumping in my footsteps, hiding behind me as they toss hasty snowballs that explode in midair and shower us with speckles that disappear the moment they touch warm skin. I cannot bring myself to spoil the fun.
Thankfully, we are the first to arrive. The wind has cleared last night's snow off the ice, and the children chatter as they pull off their boots and put on their skates. David kneels down to help me with my laces, then quickly ties his own. He follows his son and daughter through the sticks and reeds and rocks half-frozen in what during warmer days would be the water's surface. I watch them skate from the bench someone has placed on the shore for this purpose, then stare at the stone church across the way, thinking it hardly looks like a church at all without a steeple and finding some comfort in that. I call out to David, and he comes back, gives me his arm for support, and guides me through the rough spots until we are out on the smoother ice at the pond's center, where the sun shines strongest and the children usually play.
I stand on wobbling ankles as he lets me go. "You can do it!" the children yell. They skate around me, faster and faster, my stepson's cheeks bright red, my stepdaughter's hair like a mane. The sky above us is bright blue, the surface below cold and white and hard, and the wind makes my eyes ache and sinuses burn.
I glance at the church once more for confidence and hear again the woman's voice from the radio, talking about war and bombs and the blurring of seasons. What is she doing this very moment? Is her today any different than yesterday? When was the last time she had her fill of pancakes or coffee or was able to sleep in peace with her husband wrapped around her, breathing softly in her ear while he holds her like a promise for tomorrow?
I shake my head and sigh, watch my breath float up toward the naked treetops. A seagull passes overhead, searching, as always, for something to eat. I watch him glide in endless circles until I feel dizzy, but still I cannot look away. Finally I hear my family again, this family I once thought was temporary, shouting for me to try.
"Spring is not that far away," I whisper, as though God needs to be reminded, and take my first cautious steps along the ice.
My children watching, my children smiling, my children clapping when I do not fall.
Copyright 2006 by Kathy Kincade
