Drive on

The van was quiet and still - an anomaly because inside it were five children and two adults. As we descended down from the higher elevation in Wyoming, the desert-like landscape around us began to disappear into the thick fog we were crawling into. In a moment the clouds had descended upon us. We drove on. I looked out my window but there wasn’t anything to see, just a dense, white-gray mass of nothing. My husband pushed a few buttons and music slowly filled the air, bringing a calm and gentle presence to everyone. Except me. 

It felt eerie. 

It felt familiar. 

We drove on. 

I looked straight ahead and saw nothing. I hoped we were heading in the right direction. I hoped nothing would get in our way. I hoped, but I didn’t know because I couldn’t see. 

My eyes strained to see something, anything around us, searching with no luck for some glimmer of light shining in the distance. I wished it was just black, because our lights would have illuminated the darkness around us. But nothing we did could make us see through the thick fog suffocating our van. 

The eeriness settled a bit, like a foot slipping into an old shoe, comfortably fitting into its familiar impression. 

As it settled, a word began to echo through my head. The word that had taken my breath away several years before. A most unwelcome word, but it didn’t matter if it was welcomed or not because it had made itself quite at home within me. 

The word explained why it felt as if I was living in an old black and white TV show. 

It explained why the sound of my children’s laughter didn’t make my heart pitter patter the way it used to. 

It explained why tears stopped falling. 

It explained why, no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I strained my eyes and searched the world around me, I couldn’t see a light shining in the distance. 

The world is easier to explain when it is black and white. Dark and light. If my world were dark, I could just shine a light and illuminate the darkness and the light would show me the colors I longed to see. But when your world is in grayscale, when it is surrounded by a thick fog that feels suffocating, no matter how bright the light, you’ll never know what color her hair was supposed to be, or whether the sky was blue and the leaves green. 

We drove on. 

And I remembered. 

I remembered how desperately I wanted to feel something but even the desperation felt numb. I knew I needed to feel desperate, but I couldn’t actually desire it. 

I remembered how trapped I felt. I kept my eyes forward, looking for the light. I’d ask the people around me, “Do you see any light?” They’d look at me with pity and tell me to keep pressing on, “You’ll see it eventually.” But “eventually” doesn’t help when you’ve seen nothing for hours… or is it days… or maybe months? Everything blurs together in a mass of white-gray. It's thick. It's dense. Maybe it will never lift. 

Maybe we’ll be trapped in this suffocating, colorless void forever. 

Maybe there is no end in sight. 

Maybe the fog will creep in through the windows, the vents, the doors and slowly fill the entire van until it is consumed completely by this mass of gloom until I can’t even see the people I love anymore. 

My heart begins to beat faster and faster as the word in my head begins pounding to the rhythm of the blood rushing through my body. 

My husband glances at me and even he can’t tell the storm brewing inside. My face is blank; I muster a smirk. 

And then he reaches for my hand. 

He touches me. 

His touch instantly reminds me that I am not alone. 

I look out the window again and… do I see… a shade of green? A dusty, murky shade, but a color, nonetheless. I squint my eyes and stare in front of me as a circle begins to take shape that slowly separates into two circles of white that grow and grow until I realize - another car is about to pass us, and we can see the headlights shining through. 

I hear a little giggle from behind. A little chatter from the back. 

More shapes begin to form around me. I see the hazy red roof of an old gas station and soon the houses begin to reveal themselves, too. 

Whether the fog lifted or we drove on until the fog was behind us, I’m not sure. 

But it doesn’t matter. 

We drove on. 

We kept going. 

My eyes didn’t shut. I didn’t stop searching for the light. I didn’t stop longing to know what color the sky actually was. 

We drove on. 

My friend… drive on. 

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