Originally published April 17, 2004
Sue's guest room is mauve now. Ew.
I hadn't stopped in Cheney the last couple of times I visited Spokane. It ain't for lack of wanting to; it's just difficult for me. It's like looking at a photo album chronicling the happiest times of my life, only everyone I cared about is airbrushed out of the photos. Nothing remains but the backgrounds. And yeah, that aches.
Nevertheless,
to merely pass the exit for Cheney feels as wrong as driving
by my mother's grave. That time, those people, that me—these
things and their passing must be acknowledged. So when the
pine trees appeared around Tyler, I took the newly named
Michael Anderson highway, wove through the familiar
rolling yellow hills, traveled back in time, and stepped into
those photo backgrounds alone, fairly wallowing in sadness.
There's where we met. There's my first classroom. There's where we ate on our first date. There's the PUB. I wonder who Mariko's lunch date is with nowadays? There's the railroad tracks I used to walk at night. There's Hilari's shitty apartment. I gave her a blanket to use as a curtain on that window. Huh. Same blanket I use every night, still. She just vanished. There's my first place. I wonder if the ping pong table is still there. There's where we had our first kiss. There's Phil's old place. That stupid slanted half-step nearly killed me, and they still haven't fixed it. He just vanished, too. There's where we used to throw the frisbee and I would hit her softballs so she could practice fielding. Man, she sucked at ground balls. There's Patterson 266, the classroom where I met Katrina and Pam and Mark. There's Elizabeth's old house, and Sharon's, and Karen's. Poor Karen. There's the hills Pam and I went horseback riding on. There's that vet that tried to stick me for $200 for dropping off a dead dog. Talk about blood and a rock. There's another place we ate on our first date. Jesus Christ, how many times did we eat that day? There's where we lived. What a happy house. Okay, driving on, I can't remotely deal with that.
Symptomatic of the fact that we were all broke, there were two Trash TV nights in our circle. In Spokane, it was Melrose night; in Cheney, it was Star Trek. When Deep Space Nine premiered, we were there. I remember growing bored during the DS9 series premiere. Sisko had lost his wife years earlier, an event we come to relive in flashbacks. He's simultaneously trying to explain the concept of linear time to aliens who live outside time—they have no sense of future or past. They find the notion baffling. What vexes them, it turns out, is Sisko himself. If the past is in the past, someplace you cannot return, why does he insist on continuing to reside there? I remember yawning at that point and looking at Phil, who was visibly devastated, and thinking "Jeez, what a puss." Well, today I'm the age he was then, and perhaps not coincidentally, I get it now.
Lo, I am basking in irony.
A few hours after my Cheney tour, I sat in Sue's living room, covered in mauve paint and reminiscing with her and Lynn. These reminiscences only become more brutal over time, as we wonder whatever happened to so-and-so or talk about someone else's lovely memorial service. It's sobering.
"What was the name of that girl you dated here, John?" Sue asks.
"Fucking Amy," Lynn and I groan in unison. I frantically search my mind for a new subject. There's one!
"Say, does the ironing room need repain—"
"Man." Lynn shook her head. "I've never seen anyone get creamed as bad as you did. I mean, you were completely destroyed. Bet it all and lost. I sometimes wondered if you'd ever recover. But, thank God, you eventually pulled out."
"Yeah," I stared at my feet. "I'm all better now."