The night is dark, and I walk slowly and alone in this poorly lit area of downtown. The small expanses of green, manicured and complete with shrubs and this or that monument remembering this or that event or person, seem large and out of place as they do in all small city-towns bleeding with growing pains of modern success around the edges but holding, clinging, to a heart remembering the efforts and fortitude of a village in times where success didn't come so easily. Those bigger cities don't have these places. They have been razed, fully or near to, by strong march of prosperity over centuries, and now memory-less high rises stand in the stead of trees and parks and old courthouses and stone jails. But not here in Charlottesville where the community holds on it its heritage. Beyond heritage, there is little else to which to cling.
I grew up in an even smaller place. Or more accurately, just a little ways away from an even smaller place. Beyond its miniscule heritage, there is even less to hold. And that small town holds on so desperately to its past that it has strangled its future. It suffocates its kids with stale air of bygone days and fogs their minds and its streets with times and things which should be remembered. But this town more than remembers. It worships these bygone days to even their faults. And instead of learning from these mistakes, they repeat them, daily, ritualistically.
The green park has an empty feeling and that more than echoes the sentiments of my heart as I walk alone, missing this person or that in my life. Back as a student at the University of Virginia, only minutes west of here by foot, I had spent many nights walking alone on the Lawn. Some nights I walked enjoying my independence and strength, and others cursing this or that person for letting me down. Usually the culprit had been myself. Tonight, however, I didn't have a statue of Thomas Jefferson or George Washington to berate with epithets meant for myself. And so I stayed quiet, listening to the truths about myself which my heart spoke with each beat. Its such a shame that a heart as large and as full of warmth as my own, has so little pity and patience set aside for myself. Silence is usually my best way of putting up with its acid and bile which it only showers on me. I can't argue with these truths. I can only ignore them or find exceptions.
The silence of the Lawn on those nights in my beginnings of college often drove me out of the shadows of the shrubbery to the burning and blinding lights of the Rotunda, which often seemed to offer fortitude behind the strength and size of its temple-like columns. I would hurry my feet through the dew covered grass up to the marble steps of the building and sit amongst single strangers, usually male, and quiet or whispering couples comfortable holding one another in the twilight stretches of light emanating from the Rotunda dome, impervious to the solitude of those around them. Here away from the harsh overhead lights of the Rotunda, but within its corona, I would hear the bustle of the city and feel the warmth of its dying nightlife. The drunken calls of some student adds confidence to my stature, or the sound of siren blatantly reminds me this night hadn't reach the full potential of its darkness. Here I could pull the energy of the city with out losing my anonymity to gawking faces of pedestrians or passing drivers.
But these nights in the twilight fringes of the Rotunda's glow ended as cold as they had begun in the shadows. The comforting light would give way to the persistent chill of the marble steps, and my legs aching, I would eventually, regretfully, stand and begin the long walk back to my dorm room on Observatory Hill. My yearning to relieve the loneliness filled, I could bring myself to a less troubled sleep in these early morning hours.
Tonight, the deserted expanses of black-green yield, to the right, to the less harsh luminescence of the old Albemarle County Courthouse. The small lamps that guide empty streets to other empty streats light the ghostly ancient brick buildings that slump worn and haggard above these same asphalt paths. The sounds of the city, here, in its heart, are much quieter. The pulse is hushed, slowed, as the breath of a sleeping child just before the morning. And there is the sense of peace and resignation that guide this emptiness through the night, calmly, until dawn will bring company, once again.
Like a moth, I'm drawn to the glow of the courthouse, hoping that it could bring the supplication I once gleaned from the Rotunda on similar nights. Buts it single worm brick step is empty, and its glow a false beacon, a hollow promise. I set myself on the single step, at least to indulge in the beauty of my morose mood, an appreciation, if you will, of my ability to feel, even if only loneliness.
Time grows longer, and with each epoch, the city grows more hushed, quieter as even distant traffic thins and the latest of the night owls retire before dawn. Weary, cold, and stiff from my long rest on the moist brick, I pull myself to stand, only to be startled by nearby whispers of two lower voices. I settle again to watch, as these become only my second encounter of the evening.
Two young men, maybe twenty each, slowly walk along the side street from the apartment neighborhoods behind and away from the courthouse. I see their steady, methodical, and conscious slow gate, and listen amazed at their whispered conversation. They walk just a little too close. They talk just a tad too quietly and gracefully. Their movements are a bit too rehearsed and their mannerisms a hair more fluid.
I watch, amazed, as they pass the turn in the sidewalk and find themselves, quite literally, faced with my unashamed gazed. The taller boy, with dark brown hair, clean shaven and plainly dressed, is more broad and thick than his companion, who with light brown ore even blond hair is noticeably shorter, thinner and more spindly. He is dressed more stylishly, but only slightly, and his movements are more graceful while the larger is more gangly and awkward. But both are very comfortable and secure with each other. The smaller guy is more volatile, switching from fiercely independent to more affectionate instantly, while the other, resembling me quite strongly in many ways, stands more solidly, but yet more dependently.
They passed by with no formal salute, but their gestures were friendly enough. They understood from my undistracted stare that I was not a threat, but mere curiosity much more like them then unalike.
They seated themselves quietly, gracefully, on the far steps but shadowed from the brightest lights, where the smaller reclined against, and between the legs of, the larger, and continued flawlessly their fluid conversation. There was a whispered hush, and the motions of a kiss on the head as the two settled comfortably against each other for enjoyment of a peaceful night downtown. I watched them but for only a few moments more, before the hard moist brick would drive me away from the comfort of the light.
Walking now in the solitude of shrubbery once again, I think of a time when I sat in the twilight of the Rotunda steps. A time when the harsh marble had not drained the vitality I pulled from the calling city. A time when I had not sat in solitude as most of the men there had. A time when the warmth of the pulse of the city paled to the warmth of your skin against my hands. A time when, I, awkward, had accompanied you on your walks instead of mine. A time when you had reclined between my legs and I had kissed the top of your head. A time when biting wind fell harmlessly against my skin, but your touch would burn. And a time when I flet beautiful and prideful and loved.
That night we left the Rotunda’s steps, walking together through the shadows, to your apartment in the thriving city welcoming those who I met to look at my face. Welcoming them to see me, spectacular with a shine, a glow, which didn’t require the lights of the Rotunda or the pulse of the city. I could feel your pulse, racing like electricity across my skin, and pulled the life from that spark, well after I stopped holding you.
I can enjoy these evenings alone, here in the quiet downtown of Charlottesville. I think of my home in the thriving Fairfax, my parents home in the quiet woods off to the east and south of the city, but I can think of no where I would feel more complete than in that room of yours, as long as I was holding you. Knowing that I will again hold you is reason enough to walk home and so I leave the quiet, predawn, downtown for a brisk walk to your apartment.