The gathering, for it was too subdued to be considered a party, had just begun. My uncle and I sat alone in my parents' small living room grinning uncomfortably at each other. The "women" were in the kitchen going through the ritual of preparing dinner. As soon as everyone arrived and greeted each other, the women would head for the kitchen, and the "men" would gather at the horseshoe pits behind the garage or in front of a televised sports event. It had been that way as long as I could remember. It always seemed to me that someone should be outside looking for the invisible snowflakes, but no one ever took my feelings about them seriously. I did not mention them much after I was ten or so.
My uncle interrupted my train of thought. "Well, Jason, you're a college graduate now! How does it feel?" He leaned forward in his chair, a large overstuffed recliner that my father would not let my mother get rid of, in spite of its shoddy appearance.
I stared vacantly at my uncle. "What?...Oh, fine, I guess." I hesitated, not knowing what else to add.
My uncle sat back in the white elephant, evidently satisfied with my answer. He then launched into what sounded like a pre-rehearsed speech, one he had delivered before. "Jason, it's the beginning...Now you can go out in the world and kick their asses all the way to...to wherever!" He flung his hands up in the air on this last to emphasize the boundlessness of my ass-kicking potential.
I grinned, "Yeah, I guess so."
"Of course you can, Jason. How old are you now? Twenty? Twenty-one?"
"Yes, twenty-one."
"Twenty-one! God! You have your whole life ahead of you. What are you going to do now, Jason? You ought to get hooked up with some big insurance company or real estate or something, huh?"
I grinned. "Well, I think I'll just relax for a while and try to figure out what I do want to do. I think I'll probably go to graduate school and maybe teach, but I'm not sure yet."
My uncle rode forward on the white elephant, grinning broadly. "Well, sure, no need to jump in right now. Take it easy for a while. Sow some wild oats. How old are you now, Jason? Twenty-one? Twenty-two?
"Twenty-two."
My aunt came in from the kitchen busily wiping her hands on her spotless apron. "Well, Mr. College Graduate, how do you feel? Ready to lick the world?"
I smiled back at my aunt. "Well, Aunt Charlotte, I just turned twenty-three. I think I'm gonna start grad school next year, maybe."
Aunt Charlotte grinned. "What are you going to be? A doctor? A lawyer?"
"I don't know really. I'm admitted in the English department. Maybe I'll be a teacher...a professor."
"Oh, that would be wonderful! My nephew, the professor!" Evidently satisfied, she turned, still wiping her now dry hands on her apron, and went back into the kitchen.
Since I had graduated from college, time seemed to have accelerated at an unbelievable pace. It was as if time had gained momentum without the interruptions of semester breaks. There were no ways left to tell what happened last week or last year, no way to plot events referentially. Things happened in sequence but, seemingly, with no time in between. I could only measure time by the length of my memories.
My uncle woke me from my reverie. "Well, Jason, are you about ready to go back to school?"
I paused, still in thoughts of time. "Yes, I think I'll go back this fall."
My uncle grinned. "How old are you now, Jason?"
"Twenty-four."
My uncle's grin broadened. "Twenty-four! God! You have the best part of your life ahead of you!"
I thought about what he said and realized that he must have meant the "better" part of my life because I was not very sure that it would be the best.
My aunt came in from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her still spotless apron. "Well, Jason, have you started graduate school yet?"
I looked at my aunt. "No, I'm going to wait until the fall. It's too late to go this semester. Besides, I have a lot of reading to catch up on."
My uncle crossed his legs. "What kind of stuff do you read?"
I leaned back on the couch. "Oh, I like Ionesco and Robbe-Grillet and Ray Bradbury. And Thomas Mann."
My uncle nodded his head as if something he had suspected had been confirmed.
My aunt broke the awkward silence. "How old are you now, Jason?"
"I was twenty-five last month."
Looking at my uncle, she grinned more broadly. "Imagine that, Tom, only twenty-five!" She directed her grin at me. "When Tom was twenty-five, we got married, didn't we, Tom?"
My uncle nodded agreement, apparently still thinking about Ionesco.
I watched my uncle. Age was more evident every time I saw him. His once-black hair was now streaked with gray in a seemingly vise-like grip about the temples. It was as if the gray tendrils of hair were trying to squeeze the life out of my uncle. I remembered a summer fifteen or so years before, when I was eleven. My uncle and aunt had moved to Arizona the previous year, and I had gone to visit for the summer. That summer seemed to last forever. Time was tangible. It stood still and let you observe it, touch it. It called to you. Every summer lasted several years when I was a child.
My brother entered the living room, my older brother when we were younger. Now he was just my brother. I remembered that when we were children there was a period of about two months every year when he was only three years older than me because my birthday was in June and his in August. "Hi, brother, happy birthday! "Twenty-six? You're catching me. I'm only twenty-nine."
It was a standing joke between us for as long as I could remember. Now it really seemed true. I did feel like I was catching him. I remembered how it always seemed we were closer during the two-month period each year when I was only three years younger than him. "Yeah, twenty-six, but I don't feel it. Time seems to be flashing by."
My brother seemed to look inside himself for a brief moment. "Yeah, it sure does, but you can't worry about it. You have to think of the future!"
The future. Before you can think about it, it is the past. It is not an Arizona childhood summer anymore.
I looked at my uncle, but he had died the year before. My cousin was sitting in the white elephant. My aunt stood beside the chair wringing her hands on an imaginary apron.
"Jason," she dropped her hands to her sides, the imaginary apron fluttered to the floor. "Jason, the men are out back, playing horseshoes. Would you go tell them supper's ready?"
"Sure, Aunt Charlotte." I walked out of the house and around back to where I heard the clanging of horseshoes hitting metal stakes. The invisible snowflakes were melted on all the "men's" brows and under their arms.
My Uncle Fred waved as I approached. "Hello, Jason! Grab yourself a beer there in the tub. Wanna go a round of horseshoes?"
I smiled back. "No, supper's ready. Aunt Charlotte sent me out here to drag you guys in."
My uncle released a horseshoe, and it clanged against the opposite stake. "Let's eat, men!"
Everyone dropped their horseshoes and sauntered into the house. I followed, occasionally looking up to see if I could spot a snowflake before it melted. When we all were seated at the dinner table, my mother came in from the kitchen carrying my birthday cake. She placed it in the center of the table and lit the candles. "Make a wish, Jason, and blow out the candles!"
I closed my eyes for a moment, then opened them, and, with the urgings of my relatives, blew out the candles. I watched the twenty-seven wisps of smoke wafting toward the ceiling, curling around the invisible snowflakes, and then disappearing. When I looked back at my family, I noticed that the snowflakes had melted on their cheeks.
"The trouble with our times is that the future is not what it used to be."
PAUL VALERY
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