The Eden Express (18 page)

“Well, let’s go.”

“Yes. Let us go.”

Across the street to the Marine Inn to use the pay phone. I tried to call my family. It took forever to get the operator. Terrible agonized electronic screeches coming through the whole time. There was no answer. No answer at the Barnstable place? It happened, but not often. I’ll try again tomorrow. I went to the bathroom while Simon made a call to his sister in Cambridge.

The fluorescent light in the bathroom was just about to die. It was stuttering like a strobe. I watched my arms and legs stutter through
space. “Maybe the light is fine and it’s me.” My breath, my heart, my everything started stuttering.

Mirror, mirror on the wall. There was usually something slightly unexpected waiting for us in a mirror after two or three weeks at the farm, but what I saw this time was totally other. For starters I looked at least ten years older and twenty pounds lighter. There were lines in my face that I had never seen before. My beard seemed much longer and fuller than I remembered it. I was entranced. There was a depth of feeling I had never seen before. An authenticity, a wiseness, an utter lack of games. I was awed. It was somehow what I had always wanted to see in the mirror but I still had trouble believing it was really me. That face was real. It was not a face that cried wolf.

How long have I been here staring at myself? The strobe was freezing me. What if the door’s locked? What if I open it and there’s nothing there? What if they’re all dead? What if I’m dying? What if this is how it ends—in a plastic bathroom that could be anywhere? What if, what if, what if when I open that door I don’t know where I am? Where am I?

I threw some cold water on my face. One foot in front of the other, one moment in front of the other. It’ll all keep going. Somehow I got to the door. Somehow I opened it. Somehow Simon was waiting in the lobby. Somehow I was in Powell River, British Columbia, Canada. Somehow I shrugged it off.

“Goddamned light.”

 

Simon and I headed out to Car Car.

“Under no circumstances can I be locked up, Simon. I cannot go to jail.”

“Relax, Mark. No one’s going to lock you up.”

“I will be all right, Simon. I just need a little time. Getting locked up would ruin everything.”

As soon as I started driving I felt much better. Things were still very strange but driving felt good. I loved my car, it was running beautifully. Driving along deserted Highway 101 at night. Up the hills, down the hills, round the corners. Everything was fine. I could do it forever.

It was taking forever. “My life certainly has gotten very full lately. It seems there’s more happening in five minutes now than used to happen in years. Maybe I’ve just never really paid attention before.”

I turned on the radio. The only things I could get was some station from Detroit playing old rock songs. All my favorites. “Shop Around,” “Momma Said.” The DJ kept talking about memory lane. “My Girl,” “Dream,” “Take a Message to Mary.” He was playing exactly the songs I would have played had I been in charge of some “end of the world” radio program. It seemed strange to be able to pick up a Detroit station and nothing else, and that clear as a bell. One radio station left, wrapping it up. “Golly gee, fellas, that’s sweet. Just for me.”

Simon seemed to be nodding off. I looked over at him. What an angel, a big, bearded Pooh bear with a Jewish afro. I guess I had been hard to keep up with of late. I wasn’t the least bit tired. I could go forever. Driving the car, listening to old songs forever, I couldn’t imagine anything that would feel better. I had it down pat. Something else might not go as well.

I hadn’t slept for what was probably only days but seemed to stretch back forever. It was like a whole other existence. “Oh, yes, I remember back when I used to sleep.” I dreaded sleep. I was afraid that face would come back. Besides, I was having such a good time being awake.

 

There was some very good reason for going to have a beer at the Lund bar. I didn’t know what it was but that made it an all the better reason.

Magic, wonderful, wondrous things happened when we went to have a beer at the end of Highway 101. It was apparently just the right thing to do.

The most wondrous of the wondrous things was what happened between us and a local guy about our age who came over to buy us drinks like he was pulled by some cosmic magnet. The big thing about him was how cheerful he was. He couldn’t stop smiling. We couldn’t stop smiling back. Here was a perfect example of lots of the things I had been thinking and trying to explain to Simon: how pleasant life could be, how we were all one, how nothing bad could happen.

He used to work in the mill. He had just quit that afternoon and was out celebrating. We congratulated him. We got to laughing, telling stories, slapping each other on the back. There were some ESP-type things and cosmic messages, but the big thing, the thing no one could argue with, was what a wonderful time we had, how famously we got along.

This was the way life should be all the time. This was the way life could be if everyone stopped worrying about all the silly things they worried about. This is what Jesus wanted. We were all in love.

The bar was closing. We hugged our new friend good-by and Simon and I went and pissed on the tippy-top last little bit of pavement of Highway 101.

 

On to the Prior Road commune to crash. I had put it off as long as I could but everything was closed and Simon was very tired.

We were always welcome at the commune. It was a kindred place with kindred people and kindred dreams.

Was Virginia there? It was possible. There was a red Microbus in the driveway with California plates. We opened the door. It was dark. There were a lot of people crashed on the floor.

Softly, “Could we crash on the floor?”

Softly, “Sure.”

If Virginia was there she didn’t say anything. Maybe she was, maybe she wasn’t, but I wasn’t going to make a big deal asking around. Besides, this was maybe her last night with Vincent or whoever she
was with before she came back to the farm and me. I felt like an intruder, so I just lay down trying to be as unobtrusive as possible.

The sound of very gentle lovemaking came to me while I lay there, and a soft female voice: “We should have done that a long time ago.” Was it Virginia’s voice? I listened closely but there was no more. Everything was quiet.

 

A HALF-DREAM. I am in heaven, where the senselessness of pain is clear. The feeling is of peace and fullness. There’s a slight giddiness just below my chest. The magic place of no shadows. Then a sharp pain in my foot, a small bump on the sole, between my toes, like a plantar’s wart. Around it tender and sore but there is no sensation in the bump itself. Picking at it. Little by little I separate it from the surrounding skin. It’s a plug about a quarter-inch across. I pull at it. Pain. It seems to have some sort of roots reaching into my foot. I adjust to the pain and continue to pull at it. It starts to come. The pain very intense but strangely almost pleasurable. Amazed by the size of the thing and how I hadn’t noticed it earlier. I’ve pulled about six inches of foreign growth out of my foot, and there’s no end in sight. A feeling of relief, making my foot all warm and tingly; the more I pull out, the higher the warmth and relief spreads. I pull another six inches and panic for a moment. What if this is all there is? What will be left once I get this thing out? But the gentle strong feeling of warmth and relief reassure me I am doing the right thing and I continue extricating this foreign growth from my system. After each six inches or so I rest, basking in the warmth and relief, letting each part of my body feel its new freedom, past my knee, up to my thigh. There seems to be a particularly tight concentration around my groin that makes it feel all the better when I pull it out. Down my left leg, until my left toes turn warm and free, and up my torso, bringing peace and warmth to my belly and my lower back. At my solar plexus the resistance increases again. I feel the
roots pulling on my heart and stop, but only for a moment. “I’ve gone this far, what the fuck.” Feelings of warmth and strength make me weep for joy. I can feel the root tentacles being pulled through my whole body: out it comes, more and more. I am ecstatic as the peace passes up my throat, over my mouth, and through my nose to the top of my head. Ecstasy.

That’s what all the rushes of fear and pain were. Just getting free of the shit. Nothing but nothing is going to turn me around. Pain? Fear? Fuck ’em, this shit has got to go. I’ve seen heaven and nothing’s gonna turn me around. What is it that wants to turn me around and make me crawl back into believing all the sham about pain being unavoidable, utopia impossible? I’m a freight train, baby, don’t give me no side track, no. I want your main line, baby. Climb aboard the Eden Express. This train, this train is comin’ through. THIS TRAIN IS BOUND FOR GLORY.

It was mostly out of politeness I had held off for so long. Not wanting to make other people feel lonely, not wanting to have people look at me funny. I had been convinced that something like the Eden Express existed for some time.

I stopped being polite because the things that had predicated my politeness were simply no longer true. Time was the big thing. We were out of time.

 

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT. Thank God I screamed. I came within an ace of waiting too long but at the last moment I got my shit together and came through in the clutch. What would have happened had I not screamed out I wasn’t sure. It would have been the death of something. Maybe just the end of me and a few friends, but maybe the end of the world or worse. But I did scream. I didn’t go gentle into that black night, blackly into that good night, or goodly into that gentle night.

“STOP—FREEZE—NOBODY MOVE A MUSCLE. IT’S HAPPENING!” I reached out and grabbed Simon’s arm. My eyes were closed. I was in a
cold sweat. “DON’T ASK ME HOW I KNOW. THERE ISN’T TIME. JUST DO AS I SAY. I KNOW. THE RAIN HAS STOPPED.” It was only fair to give out a few clues, enough so that they would know that I
knew
and do what I said. The rain’s stopping definitely had something to do with it.

It might seem strange to tell a roomful of sleeping people to not move a muscle, especially a roomful of sleeping people you didn’t know. But it made sense. It made more sense than anything else in my life ever had. It wasn’t a night like any other night, or sleep like any other sleep.

Maybe there’s not really anything extraordinary going on at all, but then again maybe these feelings are right. In any event, it’s best to cover all the bets. If nothing’s going on, someone will correct me.

There was nothing to lose by acting and possibly a great deal to lose by not acting. So I acted.

“It’s all right, Mark, we’re all here. Everything is going to be fine now.” I felt my hand being squeezed comfortingly and became aware that I was holding on to someone very hard. It wasn’t Simon’s voice or Simon’s hand. It was Gary Jackson.

“And Mark?” Asking about my namesake.

“Mark’s just fine. Don’t worry about it.” I felt tears of joy running down my face. My eyes were still closed. I was afraid opening them might wreck the magic of the moment. The danger was past, the nightmare over. That Gary was supposed to be in Morocco didn’t bother me much. Stranger things had happened in the past few days.

“Boy, it sure got tense there toward the end,” I sighed, loosening up a little. “I really got pretty worried.

“And Jessie? Joe? Genie? Tom? Bets? Bea…?” Asking about people from various periods of life.

“Yes, we’re all here. Everybody’s fine. Don’t worry about it, just take it easy, Mark. Everything’s going to be fine.”

“And Virginia? I want to see Virge. Where’s Virginia?” My eyes were still closed. I loved the idea of being in this warm comfy womb
with all my friends, everyone I had ever loved. I was going to get to hold and touch and talk to them all in this new wonderful world. I wanted to start with Virginia. We had a lot to say to each other. We had been through so much shit together. And now in this big happy womb we could probably say things to each other we had never been able to say before.

“We don’t know where Virginia is, Mark. Don’t think about her now.” This soured things some. Everyone else seemed to be here, where was she? Had she not made it through the shit-storm apocalypse? Was she a casualty? Were there others?

“What happened to Virginia?” I pleaded.

“We don’t know, Mark. It would probably be best if you didn’t think about Virginia right now.”

“There was so much I wanted to tell her.” I was crying.

“There’s nothing you can do about it, Mark. Try not to think about her.”

“And the war in Vietnam?” I asked, trying valiantly to change the subject and also out of genuine curiosity. I wanted to know how everything had turned out. “And the whole race thing, and pollution, the ecology?”

“Don’t worry about it, Mark. None of that stuff really matters now.” So all that is done and gone with, I reflected.

“Gee, you know I really took all that stuff seriously.”

“I know you did, Mark, but don’t worry about it, just relax and get some rest.”

I lay back and tried to figure out how to make the best of my situation. The first problem was that I didn’t really have a very clear idea of what my situation was, and since no one seemed to want to talk about it I didn’t see how I was going to figure it out.

“Mark, this is Stan.” I felt someone take my hand.

“Hi, Stan,” I said, still not opening my eyes.

“He’s been there too. Maybe he can help you,” someone said.

“Sure hope so,” I said. “I seem to be having trouble adjusting. Can I open my eyes?” Stan, Stan, I thought. Who the hell can Stan be? Stan Getz? If I was in some sort of eternity situation with Getz I might be able to adjust, but I would so much rather have had Coltrane around. But if Stan wanted to talk to me it was better than nothing.