by Meredith Wadley
The narrow ribbon of blacktop I’m taking to see my son crests a moraine, seabeds and basement granite churned into gravel and shoved into mounds as tons of glaciation ice melted and retreated into the Swiss Alps thousands of years ago.
Cresting this moraine, I’m teetering on history with a long view.
Following the ice melt, flora and fauna colonized the moonish terrain, sheltering and feeding populations of Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon. The gatherers, hunters, and fisherfolk became animal, plant, and insect domesticators who yielded traders, storytellers, artists, and musicians. Hunters wielded tools of the hunt to transform themselves into warriors. Or murders. Healers tended the injured, the sick, the dying. Someone minted coins, carved the tip of a feather into a pen, chiseled stones to build a cloister where three rivers meet, the Aare, the Limmat, and the Reuss. And someone else converted that cloister into a psychiatric clinic where my son for now, is safe.
I’m listening to recordings of the music he once played brilliantly. Lately, riffs of discordant thoughts jam his mind. There’s little room for music making, and each week I dust his collection of guitars.
A fallow field catches my eye. I lift my foot from the gas. The egg-yolk heads of rogue sunflowers sway above bramble-like tangles of weeds—I picture offering a bouquet of flowers to my son, their brightness triggering a welcome smile.
But there’s no place to stop on this moraine. The narrow road I follow lacks a shoulder. Or safe turnout. Traffic here may be sparse, but it can be surprisingly headlong and reckless.
Like time. Like glaciers. Like neurons.
Like a troubled young man teetering on the granite balustrade of a bridge high above the Limmat; teetering on a choice.
My only choices are to accept my son’s choices. So, here I am, cresting this moraine, teetering above grief. Uncertain if my view is long or short.
Cresting this moraine, I’m teetering on history with a long view.
Following the ice melt, flora and fauna colonized the moonish terrain, sheltering and feeding populations of Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon. The gatherers, hunters, and fisherfolk became animal, plant, and insect domesticators who yielded traders, storytellers, artists, and musicians. Hunters wielded tools of the hunt to transform themselves into warriors. Or murders. Healers tended the injured, the sick, the dying. Someone minted coins, carved the tip of a feather into a pen, chiseled stones to build a cloister where three rivers meet, the Aare, the Limmat, and the Reuss. And someone else converted that cloister into a psychiatric clinic where my son for now, is safe.
I’m listening to recordings of the music he once played brilliantly. Lately, riffs of discordant thoughts jam his mind. There’s little room for music making, and each week I dust his collection of guitars.
A fallow field catches my eye. I lift my foot from the gas. The egg-yolk heads of rogue sunflowers sway above bramble-like tangles of weeds—I picture offering a bouquet of flowers to my son, their brightness triggering a welcome smile.
But there’s no place to stop on this moraine. The narrow road I follow lacks a shoulder. Or safe turnout. Traffic here may be sparse, but it can be surprisingly headlong and reckless.
Like time. Like glaciers. Like neurons.
Like a troubled young man teetering on the granite balustrade of a bridge high above the Limmat; teetering on a choice.
My only choices are to accept my son’s choices. So, here I am, cresting this moraine, teetering above grief. Uncertain if my view is long or short.
Meredith Wadley is an American-Swiss living and working in a medieval micro town on the Rhine River. Her writing has been anthologized and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Read her latest work in The Woolf, The Disappointed Housewife, Mediterranean Poetry, Subnivean, and forthcoming in The Vincent Brothers Review. She muses at: www.meredithwadley.com. Twitter: @meredithwadley. Instagram: @meredithkaisi.
Emerge Literary Journal 