For forty years after the incident with Ronel I struggled, isolated, unable to take any path in my life and keep to it. I tried to keep Pandora's box closed, believing that my emotions are all my own and what drives my choices is just me.
I would decide on serious goals only to wake up one morning, unable to remember why this was important or how it connected to my life. Motivation changed places with emptiness.
In a few days the desire to live and be would drive me to figure out my life again, to get new goals again, to actually reach a worthwhile goal.
Sometimes it would last for a while. Never long enough. Then I would wake up in the same empty space in my mind only to try again. Like a madman doing the same experiment over and over expecting a different result.
My mind would never allow me to give up. I knew I am neither lazy nor just stupid. Just nothing worked but I kept trying. I kept at it knowing that when it did not work, I would at least make it to tomorrow morning.
Even when I slept I had no rest. Every dream is a nightmare. I had nightmares to the point where it never even woke me up. Nightmares were just normal. If I were to write about my dreams Stephen King would be in awe.
Then I met Mario. I saw him twice, not even two minutes at a time. If someone told me that this brief conversation, these fleeting minutes would be what ripped me out of the nightmare I called my life. That it would wake me up to a precious dream. I would never have believed it.
After so many years of trying to find direction, of being unable to figure it out it still seems an unreal reality to be in. It was a harsh awakening in a way more painful than the scar I left with Ronel. A key to unlocking the bonds in my life but not a fast cure.
Meeting with Mario was unplanned and unexpected. I will never be able to comprehend what moves were made on the chessboard of life to ensure that our lives collided for those precious moments. Moments in answer to one singular question I asked. ‘God, how do I solve this problem that I do not understand.’
Working as an armed response officer I responded to alarm activations. Just after seven one night shift, I responded to an activation at 10 Nana street, a cul-de-sac with just eleven houses. Number ten were at the end, so I drove right up to the gate. Through the open gate I looked into the garage through the open door. They came through the connecting door to the kitchen, a man about my height and woman a little shorter.
They stopped about two paces from the door, roughly 20 meters from me sitting in the vehicle looking out through the windshield. They turned to each other , speaking. They are speaking Spanish I thought, not from Spain though, it sounded wrong. I struggled to make out what they were saying. She was asking him not to do something and he promised not to do it. The conversation ended with him putting her arms around his neck and him hugging her. Then he came my way.
‘What a Nice young man, I would like to be friends with him.’ The thought popped into my head and I had a puzzled moment I shook off. The thought repeated and I ignored it. By then he was next to the Ford Ranger I drove and put out a hand to politely greet. It happened fast, no time to think, not even to get out.
I shook his hand. He greeted politely, introducing himself and apologized for the alarm activation. I acknowledged, then his next sentence surprised me. “We flew in from Brazil for my sister's wedding.” It stayed stuck because it came over in a way that made me feel we were old friends. I congratulated and wished him well. That was the entire conversation, he went in and I gave feedback and left.
I will regret forever not asking his number.
I moved on to the next moment forgetting what just unfolded. Trying to forget. He stayed at the back of my mind though.
I continued my normal routine, doing patrols, looking at nothing and seeing everything. The next three hours passed uninterrupted, me driving around, not really thinking of anything serious or painful.
Then, sometime close to eleven, a surge of emotion erupted with me. It started off with the type of emotions you have when you arrange a classy event with important people sitting down and the family jackass comes in and disrupts everything. A really disgusted, what-is-this-now moment filled me.
In moments it turned into surprised shock, followed by a deep concern. A concern followed by, this is the end of the world as we know it. Then a sudden deep sadness. Sadness so deep, the tears started running down my face.
It all played out in a fifteen to twenty minute stretch with the sadness lingering long after. My mind struggled with all of this. There were no thought or activity that could be the cause of this.
The sadness lingered and I wrote off the rest as something I could not explain. Then half an hour later I found an answer.
The alarm for 10 Nana activated again. When I arrived, the whole cul-de-sac was full of cars. Mario was outside talking to someone. When he saw me he came to me and again shook my hand. Then he said "My father died at my sister's wedding reception tonight". I sympathized.
That was the whole exchange. He went back to the person he talked to. I gave feedback to control and left. The rest of the night I felt sorrow and a concern for the children. Not my children, Mario's children.
I drove around for hours trying to match the timeline of the events in my head to the possible timeline of Mario's sisters wedding. I struggled to get my head around this.
I just drove aimlessly, coming back to the cul-de-sac to see if everything was alright until Mario fell asleep. I think he did because the emotions stopped.
I spent the rest of the night thinking about all of this. My mind was reeling. I can feel other people's emotions. It was very hard to get my mind around it.
This started unravelling the might mare, it was only the key. After this I spent almost two years dissecting every memory from the first clear one I had. I had to find out if this was real.
I revisited memories I still want to forget and dissected conversations from the first one I remembered. It did not immediately change the habits that protected me. It did not change my life as it is. I had hope though.
Slowly the nightmare unraveled. Maybe I will have a normal life.