Dating : Timshel

East of Eden, south of San Jose, and about 300 miles north of Los Angeles.

Puffs of dust rise behind tractors tilling rows of dry soil. A blanket of haze sits over the valley, choking out the sun. August in Salinas is unimpressive.

Of Salinas, Steinbeck said there were “rich years with rainfall,” but “dry years too…the land dried up and the grasses headed out miserably a few inches high and great bare scabby places appeared in the valley.” Standing at the edge of a field, she found it hard to believe this place had ever been lush.

Steinbeck also wrote: “…it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years.”

The earth cannot choose whether it’s green or brown, wet or dry, barren or bountiful, and humans can’t change what we see. But we can change how we see it and how we react to it. This is timshel — thou mayest — the power of choice.

She came here clutching a tattered copy of East of Eden, compelled by the cliched idea of timshel. Pages dog-eared and oily, sentences underlined and highlighted, spine creased with use. It wasn’t her favorite book, and Steinbeck wasn’t her favorite author. But sometimes a story, a character, or a quote embeds itself so deeply in you that you can’t shake it.

Before the first rays of light pierced the LA basin fog, she was on her way to Union Station from Pasadena. She bought her ticket, one way, and wove through rows of worn benches to find her platform. Brakes hissed into the heavy morning air as her train pulled along the platform and slowed to a stop.

Her hands shook as she held the ticket out to the conductor. “We’ll check it on board,” he said.

How many times had she taken a train north or south? Enough times to know that. She retracted her hand too quickly and jabbed a fellow passenger in the side. “Jesus,” he said sharply.

Onboard, she walked toward the back of the train — the safest place to be, her mother always told her. Though if she were to go, why not in a train accident? It’s unique and newsworthy. She saw her name on a Buzzfeed list, “Meet the Victims of the Tragic Norfolk Amtrak Accident.”

Nevertheless, she settled in a window seat in the third to last row of the last car. It was a quiet morning at Union Station, so she didn’t expect to have a seatmate. Nor did she expect her earlier victim to settle in the row across from her. Seriously?

He stowed his bag in the overhead rack and settled into his own window seat. He turned his head, and she couldn’t tell if he was looking at her or just examining the train. Maybe he was looking for the emergency exits.

“Hey,” he said. She jumped.

“Sorry about earlier, I really didn’t mean to come across as an asshole. I was just surprised. Not really awake yet,” he gave a weak laugh.

“Oh,” she started. “Oh it’s fine. Sorry for hitting you.”

“Really, it’s fine.” He paused, eyes on her, and then turned away. He popped in earbuds and looked out the window as the train jolted and began rolling out of the station.

Riding Amtrak, especially in California, is an exercise in patience. These are no high-speed trains, nor are they the newest. And in true Southern California fashion, Amtrak often succumbs to traffic since Union Pacific owns the track, and thus gets priority.

It’s at one of these points, when her train has pulled into a siding to wait for a freighter to pass, that she awakes. As good a time as any to find the restroom without having to battle the swaying of the train. Her row mate is awake and gazing out his window.

She rises and across the aisle. “Hi, sorry, would you mind watching my stuff while I get up for a bit?” He looks up and sweeps his eyes over the train car. It’s empty. Then turns to her with a shrug and says, “Sure.“

Cheeks reddening, she turns and heads down the aisle. It’s at that moment the train jumps forward, and so does she, stumbling into the row in front of her. She hears him laugh, and she can’t help but do the same. What a strange morning.

Back in her seat, she watches the freeways and strip malls fade into farmland. Rows of industrial buildings turn to rows of crops as they flow through Oxnard, Ventura, Santa Barbara, Goleta, and then grind to a stop in San Luis Obispo.

She feels a visceral pain in her stomach. This place she had loved. This place in which she had been loved. For five years, this was the home she’d never had, until she outgrew it. Now, the memories of this place — many good — lay heavy in her heart. So she pushed them down and dove into a book as the train pulled out, under the railroad bridge she used to take to his house.

Four hours later they arrived in Salinas. While she’d passed through here before — both by train and car — she’d never visited. (Beyond using the In-N-Out restrooms.)

Backpack slung over her shoulder, she stepped off the train and took a deep breath. The air smelled of soil, car exhaust, and manure. Legs stiff, she shuffled toward the parking lot, wondering what came next.

Can you even make a choice without knowing what the options are? Because now, in this moment, in the heart of California, she didn’t know where to turn next. Animation suspended.

“Necesitas que te lleven?” A yellow cab inched toward her, its driver grinning widely and motioning toward the back of the car. She remembered little from high school Spanish, but she got the point. “No, gracias…I don’t know. I don’t know where I’m going.”

“Ok, mamasita,” the driver shrugged and rolled up his window.

This left her with three options: a two-lane road, a gas station, and a burrito joint. How poetic.

She could eat, she supposed. But when she got closer, she saw the burrito joint’s lights were off and there was a sign on the door. Closed on Monday.

Sighing, she slumped onto a bench outside the building and gazed at her feet. Her white Chucks were now dusted with a fine layer of dust, and some gravel had crept into her left sock. She removed her shoe, stripped off her sock, and shook it out.

It was then, one foot bared, waving her sock wildly, that her row mate approached. “You waiting for your ride?”

Goddamnit. Him again. Sock in hand, bare foot lifted, she glanced up and muttered “I don’t have a ride.”

“Well, do you need one?”

“I don’t know where I’d go.”

Why was she taking her anguish out on this stranger, this poor man she’d jabbed in the gut just hours earlier? Was she bothered by the fact that he sat near her in an otherwise empty car? That he laughed when she stumbled on the train?

He took a breath in and out, and said, “Ok. Be safe.”

It took only a few steps before she rose, hopping on one foot, sock still in hand, to stop him. “Wait, sorry. I’m sorry. I could actually use a ride, yeah.”

She saw him raise a hand to his face. Long pause. “Ok. Alright. I’m just over here.”

The car was warm inside, smelling of old cloth seats and must. The engine sputtered and turned over a few times before it took, and they sat in silence as he let the engine level out and the AC kick in.

“Where to?” he said, not looking at her.

“I don’t know.”

He turned quickly to her, eyes narrowed. “What’s your deal?” Then: “Sorry, that was rude. Again…not much sleep. So, you have nowhere to go?”

“It’s not that I don’t have anywhere to go,” she started. “I guess I have everywhere to go…I just don’t know where to start.”

“You are an…enigma.”

He shifted the car into gear and drove out of the parking lot. They sat in silence until the car rolled to a stop at a stoplight. It was nearly dusk, and the sky was a smoky orange. Up north, foothill fires burned.

“Do you need something to eat?” he offered.

“Yeah, actually, that would be nice. I’ll eat anything.”

She wasn’t sure what she was expecting, but it wasn’t a McDonald’s drive through. Did she think this stranger was going to take her to a local steakhouse? Sit down and ask her about her day? He’d already gone out of his way to help her.

As they pulled up to the order window, she reached into her backpack, searching for her wallet.

“Don’t worry about it. It was like four dollars,” he said.

She said a quick “thanks” and clutched the bag in her lap.

“Is a motel okay? Do you have money for that?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’m not poor or anything,” she said, too quickly. “Or a hitchhiker.”

He nodded and wove his way through traffic to a Holiday Inn parking lot. After pulling into a spot, he turned to her and said, “Well, good luck I guess.”

Frozen, she stared back at him.

“Well?” he offered.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

“Now you’re asking?” He caught himself, paused, and said, “It’s Ryan. What’s yours?”

“Maria.”

“Nice to meet you, Maria.”

She grabbed the door handle, hefted her backpack, and stumbled awkwardly out of the car. Sometimes she felt unable to function as a human being, like a robot with bad code.

Behind her, Ryan backed out of the parking spot, engine still sputtering. Before her, the sterile automatic doors of the Holiday Inn whooshed open.

“Hey.” He had rolled down his window.

“I don’t know who you are or what your deal is, but I hope you find what you’re looking for.” He paused. “I don’t know why I care, but I do.”

So many thoughts filled her mind that she could say nothing at all. As he rolled the window up and drove off, she remembered her favorite line from East of Eden: “I wonder how many people I have looked at all my life and never really seen.”

How the fuck did she end up here? Standing in front of a Holiday Inn in Salinas, California, clutching a copy of a book she hadn’t read since high school, with some big idea about finding herself. Confounding some poor stranger who had only tried to help, and probably thought she’d escaped from a psychiatric ward.

She might as well have.

See, she came here following a shattered relationship that had left her a shell of the person she’d been seven years before. She came here, to this purgatory, to force herself into making some choices.

See, she could have gone anywhere. It just so happened that in a fit of emotion, she slammed her hand against the wall and East of Eden fell off a shelf. She knew she needed to go somewhere, and what better place to be totally anonymous than Salinas?

As she gathered her things, she remembered the weak argument at the center of her capstone paper about the book: That what separates humans from every other being is our power of choice, or timshel. (No shit, that was literally the point of the novel. She got a C.)

2,566 days. She had that many days over which she could have chosen to leave him. She had that many days (minus, perhaps, the first few hundred, when she didn’t know any better) of being controlled and demeaned; of walking on eggshells and being wrong even when she was right. Day by day, he chipped away at who she was.

She remembers a night in college, shortly after she’d introduced him to some of her best guy friends. Later, in the parking lot, Max pulled her aside and asked her if she was okay.

Max, who in another life would have been hers, and she his.

Max, who had admitted his love for her days after she’d met him, not knowing yet that he existed.

“Yeah, how come?”

“You just seem different. I don’t really like the way he’s talking to you.”

She should have listened to him. She should have fucking listened.

Slowly, subtly, he tore her apart and broke her down. He was one person one day — loving, funny, caring — and another the next — terrifying, angry, cold. He left her and begged for her back. He told her she was his everything and then told her she was nothing.

And the worst part? She believed him. She accepted the fact that she was crazy and broken. She believed she was undeserving of love.

For those 2,566 days, she was strung between bountiful and barren. She became too good at remembering only the good days and pushing away the bad.

She hated herself for never being strong enough to make the choice to leave. When he finally made it for her, she felt waves of pain, anger, resentment, sadness — and relief. Slowly, she started believing her friends and family and therapists: She was not crazy, she was simply a human. She was deserving of compassion and love even at her lowest.

Ryan, this stranger she’d met hours ago, showed her more compassion than he had in years.

Now, she sat on the edge of a lumpy bed in a dated hotel room overlooking a freeway overpass. What a miserable place she had chosen; but what a wonderful feeling to finally have the courage to make a choice for herself.

At some point, she wandered to a nearby convenience store and bought a bottle of whiskey. She hated whiskey, because he loved it. They used to make Manhattans and Old Fashioneds or sip it neat. On nights out, they’d do shots of Jamison at Black Sheep or Bull Tavern or Frog & Peach or, if the night was especially long, at McCarthy’s.

He was always nicer when he was drunk.

Walking alongside a two-lane road, she twisted the top off the bottle and took a swig. Warmth, a familiar sting. She coughed and took another sip. Above her, stars dotted the sky. Living in LA, she sometimes forgot that stars existed. How terrible to live a life knowing only a black night sky.

A rustle came from the bushes lining the road, making her jump and drop the bottle of whiskey. It crashed into the pavement, spraying her with glass and alcohol. Another rustle, and she saw a startled, dog-like figure dart away. It ran for about 10 yards and then stopped and turned back. She saw its glowing eyes, two fluorescent yellow pinpricks, through the brush. Probably a coyote. Nothing she wanted to mess with, so she kicked the broken bottle toward it into the brush.

Uneasiness washed over her. Boldened by the whiskey, she hadn’t considered the situation she was putting herself in until this moment. A young woman, walking alone on a dark road in an unfamiliar town, nothing to light her way but a cellphone flashlight.

She glanced over her shoulder and saw that the animal (definitely a coyote) was following her. When she stopped, so did it. Ears tipped forward, eyes aglow, she saw it tilt its nose up, sniffing.

What was one supposed to do when faced with a coyote? Never turn away from a mountain lion or bear; make yourself look bigger, create a lot of noise, and try to scare it off. They never taught you what to do with a coyote. Did she charge at it, or just keep walking, ignoring it, hoping it would get bored?

For now, she stood frozen, neither option seeming particularly promising.

Run toward danger, or away from it?

How much damage could a coyote do, anyway?

A car crested a nearby hill and its headlights washed the roadway with too-bright light. The coyote turned and scampered back into the brush.

Sometimes not making a choice turns out in your favor.

For the next three days, she vacillated between anxiety and apathy. Each morning, she rose and left the hotel, walked to the nearest gas station, and bought a Red Bull and a donut. The donut was typically gone before she returned, but she let the Red Bull linger over the course of a few hours. Once finished, she walked in whatever direction her feet took her.

Today, with the sun at its apex and heat rising from the earth, she stood at the edge of a vast field. Before her, rows and rows of romaine lettuce unfurled like a brown-green carpet. Men shuttled like ants down each row, pulling heads of lettuce from the earth and tossing them into crates. This one would end up shredded on a taco in a small home on the outskirts of Avenal, a rare taste of greens in a household that could barely afford each week’s groceries. This one would end up in an $18 Caesar salad at a Beverly Hills café. Half of that would go uneaten.

Somehow inspired by this mundane revelation, she chose to leave Salinas.

Shoving her hands in her jeans pockets, she turned and walked back to the Holiday Inn. She stuffed her things in the backpack, checked out, and called an Uber to the train station. It was time to follow the footsteps of her beatnik heroes and head to Eden.

At the rental car kiosk outside the station, she asked for something that “won’t break down.” The agent rolled her eyes and slid a laminated sheet across the counter. “Just tell me what you want.”

Keys in hand, she walked to a blue Ford Focus (why were rental cars such terrible colors?) and took too long to adjust the seat and mirrors. She plugged in her phone and flicked through Spotify until she landed on the Grizzly Bear albums that had been the soundtrack to her first trip to Big Sur: Veckatimest and Shields.

That had been the last trip before she met him. A carefree, fuck-everything, day-long drive from San Luis Obispo to the northern tip of Big Sur. Lunch at Nepenthe; browsing worn copies of On the Road at The Henry Miller Library; walking out to McWay Falls; hiking along the Big Sur River.

It’s funny, she thought, how differently lyrics can hit you at various points in life.

Even wasting my time with you
Doesn’t matter if I think it through
You took the car around another bend
Ran it into the ground, let’s pretend

Winding north along Highway 1, she tried to remember how she’d felt back then. Happy. Would she even be that person again?

If I draw you upside down, I can let go
Leaves my mind at ease, gives me something to focus on

Should she ever be that person again?

I’ve found the worst half in me

How much pain do we have to remember in order to forget?

The sky keeps staring at me
Frozen in my tracks
(Nothing else to see)
And when I move my face left
You’re always standing there
(A shadow I can’t see)

How much do we write ourselves into songs and stories, as if they’re some antidote for our pain?

I left my mind long ago
Choosing something false
And when I try to face you
You’re walking away

Do we ever see ourselves in happy songs, or only in the sad?

If it’s all or nothing, then let me go

See, she always tried to see the good in people. In that allegoric barren field, she’d fixate on the remaining patch of green, cling to it, convince herself that tonight the rain would come and tomorrow the field would be lush, beautiful, green. She’d pour every bit of her being into tending that patch, until she was emptied out, until she had withered away.

Beyond the dashboard lay the prehistoric cliffs and ragged hillsides of Big Sur. By some odd, serendipitous, clichéd coincidence, she reached the end of the album and Spotify’s freaky algorithms started playing Timshel by Mumford and Sons (you couldn’t write this shit, could you?)

And you have your choices
And these are what make man great
And you are not alone in this
As brothers we will stand and we’ll hold your hand
But I can’t move the mountains for you

About three years ago, she had stopped listening to music, especially this music. It was too, too painful. Some nights, alone, she’d put on a record and drink a whole bottle of cheap red wine and allow herself to feel something for a few hours.

It was then she remembered a favorite song — the one she used to sing loudly and horribly when she drove alone. A song she had told him was all she ever wanted to hear from the one she loved.

I wish I could do better by you
Cause that’s what you deserve
You sacrifice so much of your life
In order for this to work

While I’m off chasing my own dreams
Sailing around the world
Please know I’m yours to keep
My beautiful girl

If you were to leave
Fulfill someone else’s dreams
I think I might totally be lost
You don’t ask for no diamond rings
No delicate string of pearls
That’s why I wrote this song
My beautiful girl

If there was ever a song written about her or for her, this would be it. No matter how much she hated sappy things or how stoic she tried to be, she wanted to believe that this song could be true.

Instead, he taught her that she was not worthy of being treasured or kept or missed. What was she to him but someone to control and use?

“People like you to be something,” Steinbeck wrote, “preferably what they are.”

Now, in this place, listening to a song she’d found too painful to listen to for years, oddly touched by a stranger on a train, she realized that she deserved to be not only loved, but wanted, because she was not perfect. She was reminded of this dialogue:

Abra: “I think I love you, Cal — ”
Cal: “I’m not good.”
Abra: “ — because you’re not good.”

What a wonderful feeling to be loved for what you are. She hoped to feel it some day.

Now, in this place, listening to this song again, she believed she was fucking worthy. If not of anyone else’s love, of her own. Because, Steinbeck wrote, “now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.”

Sometimes the hardest — and most important — choice is simply to believe you’re capable of making one.