The Beginning

An old man once told me that “life is just the beginning”. I didn’t believe him at the time, in fact the whole idea seemed completely preposterous. Life seemed to be one gigantic freight train, thousands of kilometres long that slowly, and sometimes, ever so tediously rolled by. Different carriages came and went, arriving at my feet just like the last one, and as sure as the sun would rise on the next day, that carriage would leave. The end was slowly drawing nearer, but at my tender and ignorant age, the day the train would finally end and no longer roll by was irrelevant. I thought that when the little caboose eventually came and passed, there would once again be nothing in front of me, just like there was nothing in front of me before the train had come.

I guess that as people grow older they start to want for different things. Children so obviously care little for what I now consider to be important, bless the little ones; they spend most of their time thinking of what their next candy will be. Not unlike myself at a young age, different candy, but the same love. My V8 Chevrolet pickup that I managed, at long last to purchase in 1949 seemed to be the only thing on god’s green earth that would ever bring me happiness, apart from the next pretty face of course, but in between the women there was my Chevy. Now it seems an utter waist of my hard earned money, 4 barrel carbs and a chrome plated exhaust were all the rage back then I spose, and for some time, it brought me happiness.

Then, a little later, when my mind no loner felt that my worth was measured by the type of car I drove, there was Rita, I still remember the first time I saw her. Hair waving in the wind, her skirt was just a little too short for my mother's liking and her blouse was a little too frisky for hers. She had a man at the time of course, walking on the beach; she had her bored expression, not caring much for the young mans football, and he had is trophy girl, but wasn’t interested in her. I didn’t have to wait long, it still cost me a black eye, but I don’t regret the pain for one minute, especially after she insisted on tending to it. Fifty years of marriage followed, her looks faded of course, and so did her blouse, but we never stopped loving each other. For a long time it was her smile and her insatiable appetite for laughing that made me happy, sometimes its just looking at someone you love that makes the world turn.

My pickup was long gone, broke down soon after I met Rita, it wasn’t even enough at that point to impress her, all the young guys by that stage were after small, fast cars. I had also lost my love of sweet things, it was Rita that made me smile, and it was our time together in our own house that made my day job worth it.

The children were next, it seemed logical I spose, if fact, sometimes I think that’s why we had them, simply because we thought we would. But not a day goes by that I don’t remember that I love them. And they’re almost all I’ve got now, seems like I’m counting down the days until there really is nothing left.

Rita left us a few years ago, I was 82 and she was 78, a good age I think. She went before living becomes a hassle, before things become so slow that the carriages of life barely seem to move, as if the engine has broken down and the whole train will soon come to a complete halt.

As for me, only one want is left. My children come to visit enough, my food is made and my bed sheets are changed. All I have to do is stay awake as the money my grandchildren will surely expect when I go is eaten away in doctor’s bills and rent for my room in the nursing home. My job is to not die. It’s a boring job, and it doesn’t pay well, so when my head isn’t too tired, I think. I think about the people I have known throughout my life, I think of the places I have been, and I think of the purpose for my existence. Younger people think I’m worthless, except for inheritance and the other people in the nursing home don’t bother making friends, for fear that they will only have more people to say goodbye to. So I want for but one thing, the knowledge that there is indeed something beyond death. I have decided that there must be, because without that thought, there is nothing more to come for me, I would feel that my life has been waisted. I believe that I have been happy, I believe that my life had a point, and I believe, as I tell my grandchildren and as my grandfather once told me, that “Life is just the beginning”.