The Stone

He held the stone in the palm of his hand for a moment. It looked so innocuous sitting there, but like most things the meaning it carried was tremendous.

How strange it felt to find this relic from his first relationship as the current one was ending. He was getting ready to move away from a life he had occupied for nearly twenty years when at the bottom of a box he found something he had not only forgot about, but didn't even remember forgetting.

The rough outline of an 'S' was still visible on the stone. Some weird layering had taken place on it a long time ago. It too forgotten.

That mark though brought him back to the first real love of his life.

Sandy.

First loves always set the tone for matters of the heart later in life. The beginning relationships always seem to fail though which only invites us to enshrine them deeper into our hearts. Later, we allow ourselves to forget the real reasons for failure.

He chalked up his loss to the simple fact of being young. Youth doesn't let us see that somethings only happen once. We get older and think we get wiser but we often forget this simple fact.

Looking at the stone now brought him back, suddenly, to the place he found it while hiking with Sandy in the mountains. The tail end of summer was warm enough to seem like the middle that year. Even the animals were a little confused by the high temperatures. He remembered imagining them running around not knowing if they should be preparing for winter or not. Much simpler to stay here in the moment. Let the heat caress the heart for at least one more day.

Sandy though, she did set the standard for which he would judge beauty for the rest of his life. Her long black hair and dark eyes still haunted his dreams, even now. He could also just barely hear her behind him on the trail, commenting on what she believed the future would hold. Her voice was lite, like a fresh breeze on the mountain. Full of hidden delights and half imagined secrets. That too remained with him.

He turned around, now, as he had done all those years ago half expecting to see her standing there. To him, she was still in the sweat drenched t-shirt and loose fitting jogging pants. There was more there though. She had a presence that was more than what you could see. There was a glow around her that reflected off her to shine on others, helping them be better people. He thought it might have been imagination playing tricks on him in the heat of the afternoon and carefully tucked that memory away for a far off place.

They had both agreed that they wouldn't sleep together. He had agreed only after some resistance and took pleasure in pretending to grudgingly dislike the idea. He did regret the lack of physical intimacy but was not only proud of the fact he could control himself but that it was the right choice for them. Somewhere deep inside he knew that they probably weren't going to be a couple forever. The paths before them split into opposite directions. Being young, they thought they had all the time in the world anyway. If they split up, they would always get back together later.

The stone dug into his hands as he struggled to fit all the memories into place inside him. Those faraway times suggested something to him. He thought that perhaps there was enough time to find Sandy again. Read to her as he had at the campsite lost to the past and the mountains. Try and reflect her light back so she could really believe she was someone and that she helped those around her be better than what they thought they could be.

He would offer up the stone as a sacrifice. Another chance to find something lost an age ago. Some hope that in finding her would heal the empty heart in his chest.