CHAPTER 3 - THE BEGINNING: THE BRIDGE TO...Part I

YES, IT BEGAN AT THE OLD IRON BRIDGE...FITTING I SUPPOSE

all things considered.

One of my favorite places to go was that big old and long-since abandoned iron bridge just up the road from my house.

Used to be really something so I am told, but it wasn't wide enough anymore and the weight restrictions made it both impractical and dangerous so all of these old bridges on this highway were replaced. The new structures, cement and steel all, are far more adequate if NOT anywhere near as picturesque.

Now this once-VITAL structure was needed no more, except maybe by me. I love to come down here, making my way along my own secret (or so I thought) path...through the brush and trees and weeds which now obscure pretty much the entire view of the bridge from the new one as cars and trucks zoom past with NO clue as to what lies so near and yet so far back into history.

The highway is close, but because it is so overgrown now all around, it all tends to act like a mute button in a way and it is consequently very quiet and peaceful here.

I have been coming to spend time and think and dream dreams since I was a little kid and have always felt welcomed by the massive old relic. Makes me sad in a way, but it also makes me appeciate it for what it used to be.

LATE SUMMER:

I  was going into my senior year in high school. Exciting time or so I thought, but in truth I didn't have a clue just HOW exciting it was about to get...for me and also for someone I hadn't even met yet but was about to.

Then one day in Mid-August, I had finished my chores and had made my way down the old roadway to the bridge. It was a beautifully sunny warm day...and everything seemed perfect and was making my mood really UPSY.

Stepping over the barrier erected to keep people from doing what I was now doing, haha, I made my way further down towards the middle of the bridge and then stopped, leaning over the rail and just enjoying the view and the peace and quiet.

Peace and quiet. Yep. Something I need like most people need oxygen.

I've always been a bit of a loner...and someone who needs my space. ALWAYS, and while that is partly because of my having S.A.D., it is also just my nature. My mother is the same way as was her father.

I also started writing at a very early age...short stories and poetry mostly back then but also music. So this was a way to 'get away' and be quiet so I could hear the creative juices inside me flowing.

SO today seemed no different than any other so far, but THAT was just about to change...
and when it did MY ENTIRE LIFE would change. NOTHING would EVER be the same again, but for now I was blissfully unaware of the impact someone I hadn't met yet would have on me.

Some days I look back and wonder how I didn't so much as sense the winds of change...swirling so near.

BUT the truth is I didn't. If I had, I wonder. Yep, I wonder.

I guess for me? This was the day this old decaying steel monster became the bridge to...

FOREVER!

THEN, I HEARD SOMETHING.
A crackle or a snap or something.
Might be an animal of course. The woods around here are full of squirrels and racoons and possums, woodchucks, you name it.

Deer a'plenty.

Then I heard what sounded like a voice. Ok, I know some of these raccoons are crafty clever and basically inteligent but I DO NOT THINK
they have picked up the finer points of English, thank you.

"Hello?"
I turned back toward where I had entered the bridge...and that is when I saw...