bedheadchicken

"ARE YOU ALIVE?"

"ARE YOU ALIVE?"

The voice was urgent. It was yelling at me wouldn't let me be. I'd hear it in bed at night listening to the radio low so that my parents couldn't hear. I'd hear it in the factory towns near where I grew up. I'd hear it in the voices of those people I watched trudge to jobs they hated every day. It was calling me, telling me that something was happening somewhere and that I was missing it. My friends couldn't hear it, but I could. It was telling me that there was somebody I was supposed to be. And I wasn't him yet.

So I hit the road. I drove as far as my car would take me. All across the country. Wherever the road would lead. Along the highway somewhere down south I met a skinny kid who called himself Elvis. I asked him where he was going and he said "To the top, man."

So I gave him a ride.

Elvis and me, we got in all sorts of trouble, and we had all sorts of adventures. There were girls, and all the alcohol you could drink. And sometimes there was a lot of money, sometimes not. And we laughed all the time and were drunk more than not. And everyone wanted to hang with us. Elvis would do his thing and all the girls would gather round. And I couldn't tell if they were there because they liked me or him, but it didn't matter much. Times were good. And I didn't hear any voices.

I got real busy. I always had places to go and things to do. Everybody wanted me to be somewhere. I guessed it didn't matter anymore if I was or wasn't the person I was supposed to be, because I was having so much fun.

Days stretched into weeks, and weeks turned into months, and months turned into years.

Elvis started getting fat. It didn't matter much. The girls kept coming. The money kept coming. Whatever you wanted was there. But one day I didn't recognize myself either. I had forgotten who I was and who I wanted to be all those years ago. Everybody looked the same to me. Everybody was looking through me and I couldn't hear my own voice anymore.

I realized something that I'd forgotten a long time ago and that a dream doesn't mean anything unless you work up the heart and muscle to get to it. And once you make a promise to yourself you have to keep it every day. Every day. And the more you let all the other stuff distract you the more lost you get. And it was like I was awake again for the first time in a long time. And without all of those other voices I could hear it again:

"Are you alive?"

"ARE YOU ALIVE?"

And I remembered that I had a promise to keep.