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s the sun sets at the Reservoir, the pollen from the pines clouds the air, leaving a thin dusting of yellowish green on everything in the hollow. The air is damp; shots from the gun range can still be heard across the lake.
Oakland Mills used to rest in that shallow indentation of the county, but sometime in the past it was demolished and flooded. Now Oakland Mills lies at the bottom of Liberty Reservoir and is split by the overcrowded Route 26. The Reservoir remains the only obstacle between Randallstown and Sykesville, yet neither town will have Oakland Mills because it is forgotten; it is in the center.
No one visits Oakland Mills much anymore; they just drive through. It is a land of the lowly with Oakland Mills Liquor being its only landmark. Oakland Mills Road still exists, though barely, and only as a mocking reminder that that little part of the world does not matter.
People do, however, live in the husk of Oakland Mills. Taking time out of one’s busy life, one can examine the lives of the inhabitants. Elderly men mow their lawns in short pants and suspenders, angry-looking old women weed their ugly gardens, and once and a while a good-old-boy will drive down to the dock in his pick-em-up truck to try his luck at fishing. All of these images are seen through a haze of pollen and gravel dust—but mostly of time and being in the center of it. The cranny of earth that is Oakland Mills remains only as a residual haunting upon the face of reality.
There is a man that lingers in that haunting, yet apart from the other ghosts that haunt Oakland Mills. He is alone in a lonely world. Off spectral Oakland Mills Road lies another path that fades off into the forgotten: Kaywood Place. That man lives in an apartment building with other lonely souls, but his soul is loneliest.
To reach his home, one must stop at a tan Jeep, almost before the end of Kaywood. That is his Jeep. One might expect it to be an old piece of machinery, rusted to the core, but it’s not. It’s a 2005 Jeep Rubicon that the man bought for his son, who doesn’t drive, much to the disappointment of the man. The Jeep is parked silently covered in the pine pollen and it seems to ask for attention every time someone floats by.
Beyond the Jeep is a carpet path between pines that leads to faded red steps fashioned from railroad ties. Down the steps and into the ivy choked path, the pollen is thicker and bees are working hard to keep it thick. Somewhere on the first floor, from where he only stalks out to borrow money, exists Jeff. That is to the right of the path. To the left stands more pines and beyond them, the landlord’s house. Above Jeff’s barely afforded apartment there is nothing. Once a man lived above Jeff, an older man who too was lonely, but one day he moved away to Canada; he managed to become worthy of a place in reality. And next to him, in a world of selfish solitude, sleeps the landlord’s grandson in all his lazy worthlessness.
Walking further down the flagged path, one can see beautiful flora all about. Every green thing truly is green and every blossom is truly blossomed. But beneath the surface, in the center, it is apparent that those things are fake, because no one enjoys them and tells them they are beautiful. The weeping willow weeps despite its splendor because it is ignored. The birds chatter in its branches and eat from the feeders hanging from its fragile limbs.
Finally, there lives that man in the flat beside the willow, that man that is loneliest of all. Inside he sits at a table salvaged from his past life, in the chair his father died in. As he leans forward, his arms rest on a towel to avoid getting sore and always in front of him are pads of yellow legal paper in the case that he needs to write something down, like a doctor’s telephone number or something he needs. One might ask why this man just sits there at his table, in that chair, and stares out the giant picture window. Why doesn’t he have a job, a family, or even a hobby? The answer to that brutal question is that like everyone else he is stuck in the center of time, where nothing happens and nothing matters.
He is a sick man, having spent fifty of his earthly years smoking cigarettes, working hard, and eating fried food. His body is ridden with emphysema, heart disease, and a kidney infection. But still, as outside time passes, he doesn’t die; he is too stubborn. He just sits and watches the birds, with the television tuned to American Movie Classics or TV Land. Sometimes he gets up to shoot a squirrel because he has nothing else to hate, because all his old grudges are gone. His family is no longer angry with him, no one hates him anymore, but has he finally found peace?
Butch is stuck between, stuck in time down in his Oakland Mills apartment. Constant bursts of oxygen keep him alive, yet with that tube, he is chained to that spot. He can’t leave his home so low in the earth. Should he try and walk out, Butch would die on his face. So like a ghost, stuck between the living and the dead, he lingers. Butch is in the center of existence and there he will remain until time should warp and he falls through the cracks and into the bliss of paradise. |
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