The Old Man

The old man sat on the beach. He looked alone, but not lonely. A serene calmness seemed to emanate from his person. As I walked past him, I heard what I thought was my name.

"Pardon?"

"It is a nice day today," he replied, as if I had been sitting next to him for a while discussing the weather. Thinking nothing of this crazy old man, I turned to walk away. "In a hurry, are we?"

"Oh," I replied, assuming I had heard the end of the conversation. "Sorry."

"No need to be sorry," he chuckled, more to himself than out loud. "Please, have a seat."

I warily sat down on the sand next to this strange figure. The only thought running through my mind was that I hoped he didn't rob me.

As if he heard my thoughts, he said, "Don't worry, I'm not going to rob you. It's just nice to have company once in a while. You looked pleasant enough."

"Thank you," was all I could think of to say. I studied this old man for a moment. He looked frail, with an air of power and mystery about him. It was as if he was once some great warrior, and age overcame him, reducing him to the feeble form I was now conversing with. He turned and looked me in the eyes for the first time, and an overwhelming feeling of comfort and warmth filled me. Immediately a smile broke across my face. It felt strange, I hadn't smiled in a long time.

"There's a smile," he said, breaking into his own grin. "Why are you so sad, child?"

I scoffed at the word child for a moment, until I realized that when I was in diapers, the man next to me was most likely retiring.

"There are too many answers to that question," I began. For some reason, I trusted this man. His smile made it hard not to. "I just haven't had the best of lives, you know? Grew up poor, parents divorced, two marriages, both ended in divorce, a kid that my wife won't let me see, and through all this, I haven't done anything wrong. As hard as I try, nothing seems to go right. I am just unable to feel happy."

The old man considered me for a moment. "Sounds familiar."

"Oh, how do you know? You're happy," I blurted out. The old man's smile flickered, and I thought that maybe I spoke too soon.

"I am happy," he said, "but I haven't always been. About a year ago, my wife of 45 years passed away. The only woman I ever loved. In the same month, I was diagnosed with cancer. The doctor said that he didn't know how long I had to live, but he guessed it wouldn't be much longer than a year." After he delivered this terrible news, a small smile began creeping up his face again.

"How can you smile?" I asked, incredulously. "How can you possibly be happy?"

"Look at the sand there, down by the water," he told me after a moments pause. Taken aback by this unexpected answer, I did as he told me. "See how the wave rushes up the beach, then slowly creeps back into the ocean?"

"Yes," I said, unaware of where this story was going.

"If you notice, the wave leaves the sand wet. Think of this wet patch of sand as your happiness."

"Now," he continued, "under the warm sun, the sand begins to dry. Think of the sun as everything wrong in your life, everything that rips happiness from you. Notice how the wet patch slowly ebbs away as the sun beats down on it, leaving dry, harsh remains."

That is how I felt lately. Dry and harsh. Nothing to quench my thirst for happiness that seemed to linger just out of reach.

He pointed out a fresh wave creeping up onto the beach. "The wave is the only thing that can replenish your happiness." As he said this, the wave descended back into the ocean, leaving a fresh patch of wet sand.

"So, what?" I asked. "I need to find myself a wave so I can be happy again?"

"No, my boy!" he chuckled. "You are the wave. Understand this, we make our own happiness. Things people say and do may make us happy, but that is fleeting and superficial. If you truly want to be happy, you need to find it in yourself. My wife died, but she was old and sick, and now she is free from the burden of life. I have cancer, and may die soon, but I will once again be with the only woman I ever loved."

I sat and thought about this for what felt like an eternity. I thought of all the things that hurt me, all the people that upset me, everything that I perceived to be wrong with my life. I thought about the wave breaking on the sand. I thought about me.

I smiled.

-The Old Man by Geoffrey Ramler

Ugh.

So, I've been without a blog for almost a month, and in that span of a month I've had so many great ideas for things to write about. Now that I have another blog, my mind is a blank slate... It's pretty irritating. What I should have done was write down the ideas somewhere so when I forgot, I could go back and refresh myself to what I thought of and write about them.

What I did was nothing.

So whatever. I'll think of something sometime. I doubt thinking is going to go out of style any time soon. I could be wrong.

Goodness...

So, I had a blog for a grand total of 2 days before blogspot's automatic spam tracker, in its infinite wisdom, decided to flag my blog as spam. Long story short, after a few requests to have my blog unlocked (as I am indeed not some robot trying to take up their bandwidth), it ended up getting deleted. So this is my second attempt at making a blog here.

We'll see how long this one lasts.