Adrian Pearson - Cow Country

Lifting my head off the table, I felt the world swirling around me. The light streaming in through the windows. A trickle of blood had run down my temple and dried onto my cheek.

“What time is it anyway?”

“It’s almost two!”

“Two?”

“Yes, two .”

“A.M. or P.M.?”

“P.M., Charlie. It’s two o’clock in the afternoon — a Saturday — and everyone’s home recovering from yesterday’s celebration.”

“What do you mean? Where are all my colleagues? Why didn’t they wait for the food? What happened to the party I spent so long planning?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Bessie dabbed a wet napkin against my temple.

“Here hold this….” she said.

I held the napkin.

“But why wouldn’t I want to know?! And why am I bleeding? And where is everyone?”

“You don’t remember?”

“No….”

“Anything?”

“No.”

“So you don’t remember what happened after you woke up from your sleep last night?”

“What sleep?”

“Don’t you remember falling asleep at the table?”

“Not really. I mean, maybe somewhat.”

“Well, that’s exactly what happened. You fell asleep on the table over there….and then Timmy woke you up to tell you everyone was leaving….”

“He woke me up?”

“Yes, Timmy tried to talk you into going home. But you wouldn’t have it. ‘No!’ you yelled at him. ‘This party is not over yet! It’s not over until the food comes! Don’t let anyone leave! Our party can’t end until I become something entirely!’…”

“I said that?”

“No — you SCREAMED it! And then you ran over to the door with a baseball bat and tried to keep everyone from leaving. With the bat in your hand you stood in front of the door blocking everyone’s way.”

“I did?”

“Yes. But Timmy wrestled the bat away from you. He was a high school quarterback, remember? Timmy wrestled the bat away from you and that’s when things got really bad. Things got really bad because as soon as Timmy wrestled the bat away, you….”

*

…As soon as Timmy wrestled the bat away from me I reached into the holster for Ethel’s pistol.

“Look,” I said to the crowd gathering around me. “I know what you’re all thinking. You’re looking around this vast cafeteria and thinking that because there is no food here, that there will not be any food here tonight. This, I tell you, is faulty reasoning. It is fallacious. Just because the rain is not falling on Cow Eye Junction, that does not mean that it never will again. And just because the sun has not yet risen on the new day, it does not mean that the sun will never again rise. In fact, everything is quite the opposite. The sun will rise! And the rain will fall on the Diahwa Valley Basin someday. And the food that I ordered will arrive as promised, by eleven o’clock…”

“But it’s already past two !” somebody yelled out.

“…That may very well be so. But what is a temporal thing like time when you are among the things of the world that are everlasting? Like love. And darkness. And the sound of ecstasy coming from the other side of the wall? The important thing is to have something to believe in. Something tangible and easy to grasp…” — I took out the pistol from its holster — “…something that is heavy to hold and rather cold to the touch. In life, you see, there are things that are timeless on this side of the room and things that come and go on the other. Things that are beyond words and things that are merely replicable. Ideas that transcend our comprehension and those that can be cited with impunity in a self-study report. Since the beginning of time there have been choices that are safe and justified and those that take us into deeper and darker places where no sun can reach…” — here I undid the safety on the pistol — “…and no light can shine. But unless we pay close attention, these things slip from us very easily. For example, just look at that strobe over there….” — I motioned with my gun in the direction of the disco strobe; a hail of gasps and shrieks rang out — “…Over there is a strobe that represents a different kind of light. It is spinning as fast as the world — and like the world itself it is casting a million pieces of light on all of us. It is beautiful, no doubt. And it is stimulating. It is shiny and exciting, yes. But will it last forever? WILL IT??!!…”

“We don’t know, Charlie! We don’t know what the answer to your question should be. But how about you put down that pistol? How about you set it down on the carpet right there so nobody gets hurt…?”

“…Well, I’ll tell you the answer. The answer to my question is no ! No, it will not last forever! It will not last forever in the same way that the Cow Eye Ranch did not last forever. And my relationship with Bessie did not last forever. And Will Smithcoate did not last forever. That strobe over there will not last forever in the same way that you or I cannot last longer than we are destined to last — in the same way that my stay at this college will surely not last beyond the dissolution of the world around me. All of these things, you see, merely come and go. And yet we love them so much while they are ours…”

I pointed the gun at the disco strobe. Another hail of shrieks and shouts rang out.

“…Sometimes we put so much value into things like that strobe over there that we lose sight of the truly meaningful things in life. We become so focused on keeping the lesser targets in sight…. — Here, I trained the gun’s sights on the middle of the spinning strobe — “…that we miss the more meaningful things that are in this world. The people who love us. The friendships that pass us by. They all come and go while we stare in wonder at those dazzling things that are shiny and sparkling and spinning….”

I pulled back the hammer of the pistol.

“The gun, Charlie!”

As I squinted my eye to align the strobe between the sights, I said:

“….But why? Why? I ask. You know, I’ve been told that there is a purpose for everything in this world. That it all has meaning. Or that it should. And so this strobe is here for a reason, right? As is this sheriff’s costume that I’m now wearing. As is this pistol that I am now holding in my trembling hand….If you want to be something entirely, they say, then you have to pull the trigger every once in a while….”

I shook my head.

“…But why? Right now I am aiming my sights at this disco strobe. A mere twitch of my finger and it’s consigned to the annals of history. Such is the fragility of the things in this world. But why should I have to commit to such a thing entirely? Why do I have to be either meat or vegetables? Why must I be either tall or short! Logical or intuitive? Infinitely complex or infinitely simple? Why must I strive to say, without hesitation, that I am this or I am that? And that I am this or that entirely ? That my geometry is Euclidean or non-Euclidean? Why should my legacy come down to either me or that spinning strobe?”

“Put the gun down, Charlie!”

“….You see, I am here to say that it is possible to be something entirely without being those other things at all. Just as the Midwest is neither west nor east, but its own place on the map. Just as the centrist Supreme Court justice — and yes, they do occur from time to time! — is neither left nor right but provides just as much value to the world by casting a deciding vote in favor of moderation. Just as the equinox is neither predominantly day nor predominantly night….but its own special time of the year. Each of these things is what it is. And each is what it is… entirely !”