I know where I am wanting to go

I have been enjoying writing my blog these past few weeks. I have been enjoying it tremendously.

What I have been enjoying most of all is one particular strain of writing. I am enjoying it so much I do not want to stop writing it, or wait for next Thursday to come back around to do it.

So I built this Friday theme, my Wild Card Day, with the intention to do whatever I want, whatever I feel called to, even if it repeats a week’s theme.

My girlfriend also asked for more of the story, and that was my cue to just go ahead and follow my gut instinct. So I will keep writing the story.

Today’s wild card is…..!

Read Part One First

The Mountain in the Clouds, Part Five

“
I crossed the threshold.

Forget that, I crossed the threshold long ago. I think it was when I was flown into the tallest chain of mountains known in all the land. Flown to a city of winged people living high in the clouds. Transported from there to some challenge of my discernment where I am told to find the center of this labyrinthine hedge maze and bring back what I have found.

But if none of that stuff counts as the threshold, then this was certainly it. Standing there in the middle of the maze with an old man who seemed to be at home there. An old man who asked if I might be willing to abduct him for the maze to present my prize to my winged host. A strange old man and his cockatrice companion who had followed us, then hunkered down beside the square pool for a sip of water.

The square pool that the first man outside the maze, the farmer, told me to find in order to progress. This was where I am to find the tunnel leading to the heart of the maze.

And then there is this old man telling me that he is the heart of the maze.

“Are you hungry?” the old man asked me.

“Uh, no. Not particularly. I wasn’t even thinking about food,” I answered.

“Well I was. I’m famished.”

The man gathered his robes and sat down. Only there wasn’t a chair. He just sat in the middle of the air, as if there were something very solid under him.

Then he pulled something out of one of his sleeves. He unwrapped it and began eating. I could tell then that it was a snorthog sausage on a pepperbread roll. Where did he pull that tasty snack from? My mouth watered.

“You sure you don’t want one?” he pressed me. “I’ve got extra.”

This time my stomach wouldn’t let me resist. “Yea, I guess I am a little hungry. Thanks.”

He pulled out another wrapped sausage and passed it to me. I was a bit embarrassed by how quickly I uncovered the food and devoured it. The meat was perfectly cooked, too. And the roll was soft and well spiced.

“Want another?”

“No,” I replied, wiping my mouth. “No, thank you, I am much better now. I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”

A small tugging in my gut asked if I might be taking his kind offering too hastily. I didn’t know this guy after all, why was he giving me food? Is it safe?

A second tugging came after, which felt like more of a knowing. It told me, nah, don’t worry about it, the man is harmless and honestly just trying to sate my hunger.

I went with that one. The second intuition felt right.

“Suit yourself,” the strange man said, pulling out yet another serving of sausage for himself.

I shook myself out of the moment.

“So what’s this you were saying about you being the heart of the maze? I don’t understand. Why would I be sent here to find you?”

The man in the brown robes looked at me with a mouthful of juicy sausage lodged in his teeth, half hanging off his dried lips. He made no efforts to hasten his eating and continued chewing for a few moments.

Then he said, “You still haven’t figured that out? Yea, what was I expecting? Nobody ever figures it. I told you, I am the heart of the maze. But I asked you some questions earlier, myself. Questions you never answered. What do you plan on doing now? Now that you’ve found me? Now that you’ve found the heart of the maze?”

“I don’t know, I really don’t know what to do. I know I was looking for the heart of the maze, but I didn’t expect it to be well, uh, you. I didn’t expect this at all.”

“Tell, me, did you expect any of this today?”

“Truth be told, no. I didn’t have any expectations coming into this. It’s all be given to me to experience. I didn’t choose any of it.”

The man furrowed his brow at me, “You didn’t choose any of it?”

“Well, I guess I did choose to accept the challenge. When I was asked to complete seven trials, I said yes.”

“Yes, it that all?”

“I chose the questions I asked of the three people outside the maze.”

“And?”

“And I chose whom I believed and whom I didn’t. I’ll beat you to the next one. I chose to walk into the maze, even with all I had been told, even knowing nothing of what to expect inside. And I chose to go left.”

“Good, I appreciate you catching on. What else did you choose, once you were in the labyrinth?”

I thought for a moment. “Well, I chose to rest after my initial walk. I sat down and rubbed my feet. Then your feathered friend over there,” I gestured towards the cockatrice. “He came by and I chose to follow him. And you. I chose to follow you.”

“And you chose to eat some of my food. Ah, now that we are caught up I will let you in on a secret. You shouldn’t have eaten my food.”

That nudging in my gut came back strong and I began to reel on the inside, thinking how I might find a way to throw the food back up. I felt queasy and sick, even terrified that I might have been poisoned and may soon be dying a painful death.

“Hahaha,” cackled the man sickly. “Sorry, just joking with you there. Hope I didn’t scare you too much.”

“Not at all,” I said trying to hold back the puking sensation building within me.

“I know, dirty trick, huh. Old man’s got to get his jollies somewhere. Not that I have a lot of conversation on this side of the hedges. Did you enjoy the snorthog, anyway?”

My stomach began to settle and I tried to ignore the sweat that had pooled up on temples.

“Yea, the snorthog was delicious, thank you. Uh, whom may I thank by the way?”

“Name? Oh, yea. Um, that’s not important.”

“What do you mean, it’s not important?” I balked. “A name is who you are. It’s your life, your identity.”

“Not really,” the old man said.

“Well I disagree.”

He sighed and continued, “A name is just a label for what you think you are. The form you are in, the shape you take in this life. You just believe it because it feels so real. Your name is just what you call yourself this time. It is not your true identity. It’s not your true essence.”

“Then what is?” I asked.

The man seemed impatient with me, as if I wasn’t getting some lesson that should be plain to see.

“Look, I’m not here to give you a course in spirituality,” said the old man with no name. “You can believe what you want to believe. That doesn’t change what is.”

‘What is.’ That’s good, I thought. ‘What is’ is making no sense to me right now.

“You said a minute ago that you don’t have much conversation on this side of the hedges. Do you mean that you have not always been living here, in this maze?”

“You are astute, I will give you that. And you are correct. I have not always lived in here.”

“Then why are you here? How long have you been here?”

The man looked skyward as if trying to recollect something.

“Ah, how long, I don’t know. It seems eternity to me now. I even forget my old life. And the people I used to know.”

Then he jolted, as if snapping out of some reverie he didn’t want.

“Anyways, that’s the past. I left it behind. I detached from it. Not important to me anymore. Not here and now where I am, doing this.”

“And what is it that you are doing here and now?” I inquired, feeling like this was going nowhere.

“Why being the heart of the maze, of course!”

My brain began to spin. This conversation was going in circles.

The old man in the brown robes who was sitting in the air as firmly as if he sat on solid wood began laughing again.

“I know, right?” he said. “I’m infuriating to talk to. That in a way is part of my purpose.”

His purpose.

Ok, time for me to think. Talking was getting me nowhere with him anyways.

“Let me think a minute,” I told him as I turned to find a place to sit comfortably.

“By all means. Understandable. Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”

After getting adjusted to my seat on the ground, I turned to see the old man now lying fully reclined on his back, as if he were swinging in a hammock. But the hammock was thin air.

Ok, get a grip, I began thinking. This shouldn’t be surprising. Not after all I have seen and done so far. He likes to sit and lie down in the air. That’s fair. If I could do that, I would be doing the same thing. What a nice, convenient skill that must be to have.

Now, on to my mystery. Who was this old man, this supposed heart of the maze? Why did he leave his old life behind in order to dwell in this confusing place of shrubbery and magic and giant mythical birds? What was his purpose here?

I recanted also my journey so far. I recalled being told by the two men outside the gate that this maze was dangerous, even deadly. Yet so far nothing has threatened my life or even caused me harm. In fact, it seemed that everything was actually working in my favor and trying to help me.

And about the woman. She told me that the maze is an illusion. So I would ask her: explain the bird and the old man. And the snorthog sausage I ate. How could all that be an illusion?

Then the task I was given by the winged woman…

Why was I sent in here to find the center of the maze? What was I to find there? What did I need to do with it? Did I even know?

I had so many stories and thoughts of this place running in my head and none of them wanted to coalesce clearly in my mind.

Then I had an “aha” moment.

I think I’ve got it.

The man is the heart of the maze. No, really, I feel like this makes sense. The man himself is the heart of this place. His old life is the world outside before he came here to be the heart. He is the life that creates this place. No wonder it all seems to respond to him so easily.

As to why he does it? It is task to be here for people like me to come along and try to figure out this challenge. To see clearly the truth of the matter and solve the puzzle.

And the three outside? I still don’t know who was lying or telling the truth, but the answers are all here, on the inside of the maze.

And there was one way to figure it out.

I planned to walk straight to the middle of the place. Straight down the path laid before me. The secret tunnel.

The secret tunnel that lay just beyond the cockatrice. It was in the pool. I could see it now. The pool led below the ground into a secret, watery tunnel!

That’s it!

Now to get on my way and finish this!
“