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Sidewalk Cafe GirlI looked up and didn't see anyone, but her presence pervaded my perception. I continued down the street, walking around the makeshift sidewalk cafes which jutted out from colorful storefronts. Maybe what I heard came on the wisp of a breeze from one of the patrons, I wondered. I shrugged my shoulders and said to myself, "Or, maybe not." "There you are," she huffed at me, "wow you're slow." Now I knew, from the blurry vision of a young woman in front of me, the voice originated from a spirit. She stood in the entryway of a T-Shirt shop on Main Street. The small white hexagonal tiles chipped and scuffed from decades of foot-traffic, now bore the invisible weight of a girl in her early twenties. Her blonde hair disheveled with exposed dark roots, swept up into a haphazard barrette, flopped at the back of her head like an afterthought ponytail. "What's the matter?" I asked. "My parents. They just don't get it." "Yeah, so what else is new?" "They think I can't have a few drinks with my girlfriends and drive home OK. I'm grown up for God's sake. When will they start treating me like an adult?" "Ummm, what happened?" Clearly, this young lady didn't know that her parents opinions didn't matter anymore. She walked beside me, using hand gestures and rising and falling vocal inflections. I saw her whitened but crooked teeth as her mouth formed words that signified her impatience at having to relay to me her story. "Well, Heather and Jessica and I went to Lights Out, you know that club on Broadway? Well, we had a few drinks and I only had 3 - each of them had a few more than me because these really hot guys kept buying them drinks. Anyway, I said I'd drive home. So, we packed up in Jessie's car and I pulled out of the parking lot and…. WHAM!" Pause… "Oh my God. I never made it home, did I?" "Doesn't look like it," I responded as I wrinkled my nose and shook my head. "Then where the hell am I? You can see me and talk to me right, so I'm still alive, right?" "Don't think so," I said shaking my head. Her hands fell to each side as an astonished look came over her face. I could see her eyelashes begin to capture the tears welling up in her eyes. "Oh My God - my parents must think I was drunk and hit someone. This guy pulled out of nowhere, I didn't even see him. I have to let them know it wasn't my fault. Oh my God! What happened to Heather and Jessie? Are they alive?" The hardest part of meeting a spirit who doesn't know they're departed comes when they realize that they're dead. The spiritual energy shifts and they suddenly transform from a vibrant soul to a hollow entity. It's quite sad, but part of the process. Sometimes being an observer warrants patience and understanding. "What do I do now?" She said, exasperated that she couldn't make things right with her parents. "I guess you just have to let the police inform your parents you weren't at fault." "That's so lame!" she whined. "Where's my cell phone?" Patting her pockets and looking through her purse, she pulled out her phone but couldn't get the numbers to depress. "Oh, come on!" she whined. "I want to talk to my mother!" I started to walk away from her, knowing I couldn't help her in this transition while she fixated on the situation. I also knew that this experience held a lesson for me, too. "Don't you walk away from me! I need you to talk to my parents for me! Tell them I love them and I didn't drive drunk. Tell them!" "Sorry, can't do that." "Why the hell not?" she barked back at me. "Because that's not how this works. You have to accept that you're gone and move forward. Me going to them is only going to confuse them and they'll have me arrested for nuisance. Sorry, can't do it." "Bitch!" she yelled at me. I remember how it occurred to me that her only concern was her reputation as a drunk driver and not the notion that she actually passed on, or any care about her family. On the public sidewalk, I couldn't raise my voice to her, not that it would have mattered anyway. I didn't need to verbalize my communication. It's funny how this "talking" takes place. I'm still not quite used to it. I continued to walk away from her and I left her taunts rang in my ears. I felt bad for her, but knew this journey was hers to accomplish. I couldn't do it for her or with her. I heard the clatter of kitten-heels behind me as I approached my vehicle. "Oh no," I thought, "here she comes again." She appeared quickly, with no time for me to put up any force-field like barriers that usually work. "Ok, I'll make a deal with you," she begged. "What's your name?" I asked. "Kaitlin Beech. You gotta find my parents." "What's the deal?" "Well, if you tell my parents about this - me being OK to drive and all - then I'll find anyone over here I can for you and tell them something for you." "No sale," I answered dryly. Suddenly I felt like Whoopi Goldberg's character in Ghost. "But you have to!" she demanded. "I really don't. And I won't," I sternly replied. "What, you don't believe me or something?" I thought her stomping foot as emphasis was a nice touch, but not enough to make me want to reach out to her living parents. Her black and white striped knit top, hung beneath her shoulders now and her black Capri pants wrinkled. I remember marveling that even spirits succumbed to earthly things like crumpled clothing. "Sure I believe you, but that's not the point." "But, you're my only hope!" "No I'm not." "OK, so show me someone else who can help me," she challenged. "You don't understand yet, and you will. Nothing is broken, and nothing needs fixing." "How can you SAY that? My parents think I'm a loser. I'm 22 years old and dead, apparently." She chuckled to herself sort of saying, "I never thought I'd get caught dead in these clothes.. but that's another story." "Look Kaitlin, things happened the way they should have. You have no wrongs to make right." "I can't go the rest of my life…." and she stopped. "I can't let my parents go the rest of their lives…." she stopped again. "Well, it's just not right, is all!" Now, I stood in the middle of an asphalt parking lot on a hot summer day, talking telepathically with a spirit only I could see. An elderly man entered his car next to mine and asked if I was alright. "Yes, thanks. Just daydreaming." I pretended to follow the bleached out yellow lane markers in the lot for a short time, while we walked and talked. It didn't help that Kaitlin kept circling around me, just to annoy me, I'm sure. "I'll get in the car with you, and you can drive," she said matter-of-factly. "Gee thanks," I responded, hoping she didn't mean it. The funny thing is, I knew I could make her go away any time I want to. But she seemed so helpless, so clueless, so innocent, that I wanted to see if I could convince her everything would be alright. "Oh my God! My diaries, my pictures…. what if somebody finds them??" "Someone already has," I said. "I'm mortified. Shit! Why was I such a slut?" "Doesn't matter," I assured her. "You had a vibrant normal life. Be happy for that." "Shit! I was so mean to my sister. Shit! She's probably in my room now, rifling through all my clothes, picking out stuff to wear. That little deadbeat. Maybe I should haunt her." I couldn't help but laugh at the profound realizations coming over Kaitlin. At least she found humor in all of this. "I gotta go," I said, climbing into my car with deliberation and finality. "You really have to help me. Please?" "Kaitlin, soon you'll recognize that all these worldly things mean nothing. Pictures, diaries, clothes, agony, fear, regret. It's all meaningless. Really. You'll see." Not making a dent in her insecurity and fears, she replied to my observation with, "Nothing huh? But I can't let them think…. Nothing? My God, my friends, my cat, look at all the things I'm going to miss. Jesus! I have to get back there. Can't someone resuscitate me or something? Maybe I can come back. Shit!" "Walk away into the unknown." "What the hell do you mean by that?" she screeched. "Just walk away from it all. It's all earthly stuff and doesn't effect you now. Just go away." "To where? Do what? I don't know anything but this one-horse town. Hell, I just started getting laid - I can't leave now!" "Apparently this lifetime meant to be short for you. Think about everything you learned. Pay attention to what you're feeling now and ask Spirit for help." "You mean God? I never went to church, Jesus!" The irony of that remark was not lost on me. "Did you believe in a higher power?" "My father is a stock broker. There is no higher power than money. Church? Shit." My foul-mouthed cherub quickly wore on my patience. "Sorry, can't help you, kid. You'll figure it out." I got in my car and closed the door. She stood there as I pulled out of the parking space, her mouth opened as if in shock that I'd leave her. She stood pigeon toed as her crumpled linen Capri pants attracted the dust of the day. I thought about all the things that DO matter. Earthly things are just that. Things. Emotions of the human variety are earthbound, too. We challenge ourselves over and over to let go and we think we can. Yet, when faced with the final "letting go" many of us exit kicking and screaming. Kaitlin taught me something valuable that day. I never saw her again, but I thank her for the lesson. Life matters when you live it. The spirit may live on in other dimensions or forms, but the journey of that particular soul in that particular body was meaningful for a small blip of time, no more. We let go of a lot of things, including our memories. When we hang on to our deficiencies and faults we allow them to hold us back from moving forward. Like Kaitlin, I once believed my shortcomings and mistakes actually made a difference in the grand scheme of life. Finally, I accepted they belonged to me, and me alone. I owned them and made the conscious decision to free myself of them. I chose to let them go and replace the limiting facets of my life with new truths about myself. © 2006 Marlene Buffa July 12, 2006 |