Flash Fiction Friday: The Idea

Published March 26, 2009

I am ever so sorry to have ceased the flow of photo posts I had partially prepared. I didn't expect to find myself sans Internet access for the whole week. Who knew the desert didn't have wi-fi?

It's Friday, and that means it's time for some Flash Fiction. In addition to Robin and Caiti, we have newcomer Gabe Stein in the mix this week. Hopefully you know the drill by now: read each of our pieces and see if you can figure out the point from which we all jumped off.  I got a bit carried away, so if you're up for a small time commitment, read on:

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So I’m in Iceland with Susan cause we wanted to get outta town for this week’s festivities, and they’re hurting so bad up here they’ll practically pay for your trip, so we got a pretty good last minute deal. I know a lotta you guys are really psyched to be around for the hubbub, but we just weren’t in the mood for it all and even though it’s a little chilly up here I just always hear about how gorgeous it is.

The only real tip we had about a possible destination was a hiking trail, so after we dealt with the rent-a-car people, settled in to our hotel, and spent Sunday adjusting to the time difference, we decided to go for a spin and check it out. It was the recommendation of some coworker of hers who gets to travel a lot, and so when she told him we were going to Iceland he got excited and said of course he had been and even had an idea of what we could do. Not even could do, but “must do.” Susan said he insisted on it, and she respects the guy so we decided to go for it.

Remember when you and I were talking about how if something’s nobody’s fault, who do you blame? I brought it up with Susan in the car on the way there because I made a joke about how if the little adventure was a bust it would be her fault because I couldn’t hold anything against this guy I didn’t know and had hardly even talked to. She was saying some of the same things you did, but she mentioned that the logic of it was connected to this whole idea of an unsolvable problem that we humans all have but only a few people really deal with. I was trying pretty hard to follow her but I wasn’t sure I was understanding what she was saying, and I think there was a really big cliff or something that we got lost staring at and when we tried to pick up where we left off she was having trouble remembering exactly where she was, but she tried to approach it differently and simplify it, and said that all she was trying to say was sort of summarized by the example of the sentence “this sentence is false.”

I got the problem with that sentence, but didn’t see how it was related, so I told her so. We were halfway to the big cliff that had distracted us when we got to the start of the trail, so we parked the car and I grabbed a little pamphlet that the guy had given Susan, and we started walking without paying much attention because she was trying so hard to help me understand and I was so focused on being helped. She started talking about how we all work off these assumptions about ourselves and each other and our world and sometimes we define things based on other things, but sometimes we can’t define a thing by anything but itself and when that happens you can’t really argue about what it is because it isn’t anything but what it is, at least partially, and if it’s not that then its nothing, or something. She wasn’t saying ‘thing’ as much as I am as I’m trying to sort it all out, but that’s what it sounded like to me then, and that’s pretty much where I am now.

We got to this fork in the path and I decided it was probably time to take a look at the pamphlet which I was hoping was some sort of map, but it turned out just to be some scrawled directions all folded up. Susan seemed more interested in explaining than deciding which way to go or helping me figure out what the paper was supposed to tell us, so I just picked a direction because I couldn’t find anything near the top of the directions about a split in the path. I don’t remember if it was right or left, but whatever it was had to have been wrong. She had started to use bigger words and more complicated sentences about other theories that hardly seemed relevant to me, and was mentioning scientists’ names and talking about logic and at this point I was just trying to convince her I understood so I wouldn’t have to keep asking her to clarify because even though I know Susan is smarter than me I hate it when she feels like there is something I should get but don’t, because I feel especially stupid then and I have a hard time even trying to understand because I’m so worried about her thinking I’m not intelligent enough for her.

As we kept following the path it started to turn downhill and away from the cliff and the rocks on the sides started to get smaller. She was talking about some guys who were fighting and coming up with theories that were trying to solve the same problem but by opposite approaches that were also trying to prove each other wrong. We got to some running water that looked at least a few feet deep with the trail resuming on the other side. I remembered hearing about how dangerous these streams could be, I think I remember a story about someone I know getting scalded, so I pulled out the directions and found a line that looked like it said “first stream okay,” so I told Susan to take off her sandals and we rolled up our pants and waded on through, her talking to me the whole time. I guess someone named Gogol was pretty much attacking Gilbert or something, and by now all I could think about was how ridiculous it is that these brainy Einstein guys are pretty much just wrestling each other with numbers for weapons and how only people like Susan take notice of when one of them makes a really good point.

We came across another stream that was a little smaller, probably no deeper than a foot, so I glanced at the directions, which said that this one was okay too. We taking off our shoes cause it was getting to be close to midday and was starting to heat up and we figured that it might be pleasant to get a little wet, so we carefully hopped across on bigger stones that stuck out of the running water. We had been walking long enough and it was hot enough outside that we were pretty exhausted, and Susan must have finally detected that I was struggling to keep up with her, so she started to slow down and stopped trying to explain her theory to me, which is not to say that I stopped trying to understand. She said she had been talking so much she had been missing the beauty of everything around; so she was perfectly content to finally enjoy it in silence. While she was taking it all in, the heat, the breeze, the view, I kept on grappling with these ideas that I still can’t get out of my head.

Anyway the reason I’m writing you all this is cause I can’t stop thinking about it even though I’m not going to be able to figure it out and neither is anyone else, and so really the only thing to do is to stop thinking about it and hopefully even forget about ever having thought of it, because I don’t think I’m cut out to be one of those people that just thinks on and on about things that do this to you. No matter how long I spend convincing myself that something is true and things are the way they are and that that makes sense, I’m never going to be able to share that with anyone else, because as soon as I do and they agree with me then it all falls apart because either they didn’t really understand me or they understood something I didn’t say or they did understand me which means that I was wrong and now we’re both wrong and we’ve not only wasted each other’s time but we’ve gone backwards. Susan would say we at least crossed one possibility off the list of ways things could be, or “rationales for reality,” but I think I’m happy with this one, even if it isn’t all right.

I would work through it with Susan or maybe, even better, try and forget about it with her, but I haven’t been able to talk to her for a couple days now. We hadn’t said much to each other for a while. She got in to her nature mood and started skipping ahead. I was mostly looking at my feet trying not to trip, but I looked up and saw her stopped at a bend around a huge boulder that must have strayed from the field of mountain sized rocks that was off to our side. She was bending over taking off her sandals and yelled back to me something about how beautiful it was and that I should hurry and check it out, that it was a huge river and that we should go swimming, and I noticed she was yelling over the roar of rushing water. Even though I was lost in though I remembered the directions in my pocket. She kept urging me to hurry up saying she was just about to jump in, so I called back that she should hold on because I had to check something first. I figured they were all connected and that it was bound to be the same temperature as the other ones had been, and sure enough “stream number three okay.” Okay I shouted, coast is clear. C’mon, she yelled back, screamed. I’m jumping! As she ran towards the edge I got close enough to see the water..

I’ve been sitting in this hospital room since we got here, even when they’ve taken Susan to other parts of the building for different tests and procedures. I guess these kinds of burns are pretty common with tourists. The doctor told me that he was surprised we even had directions even if they were wrong. Apparently most people don’t even know it might be hot. In spite of him trying to convince me that we weren’t just ignorant, it’s hard for me to imagine screams like I heard come from Susan happening more than once let alone often. He said it was a good sign that she was screaming; that if she was still able to panic the way she did the water wasn’t hot enough to be instantly fatal. Like her screams should have comforted me.

She’s still in shock, but they promise me that she should be okay. We don’t know how long it will take. I’m not sure when we’ll be able to fly back, then, but luckily the airline is flexible. Anyway, I hope you’ll understand if we don’t make it back before you have to leave town again. I sort of feel bad for abandoning you there since you made the trip, but I admit it’s hard for me to feel much right now. I’m going to look into phone cards to see if I can give you a call because I’d really rather talk than type it. Sorry if I’ve rambled or if there are bad typos. Most of this was me just working through everything, because I haven’t really had the chance to explain any of it to anyone else, or even understand it myself. Anyway, I’ll try to call you soon, or someone, or something. For now, though, I sure would appreciate your prayers or well wishes or good juju or whatever.

Talk to you soon.