Long Way Home ("Overturned", Retitled)

[Ron. Lavalette]

It’s always easier, he used to think, making the return trip; always easier driving or walking home even though the distance and the time spent en route is the same.

He reasoned that this was true because on the outbound journey one is usually filled either with eager anticipation or with dread—depending upon circumstances—and that these same feelings do not color the identical return voyage, do not provide the same elasticity to the hours and miles spent traveling.

He’d recognized this phenomenon long ago, and spent considerable time and effort to overcome it; had worked hard (usually with only limited success) to remember to appreciate every minute on the road, regardless of what destination lay ahead.

So when he traveled south toward their final parting and the hours spent behind the wheel seemed endless, he kept reminding himself to watch the clock and count the mile markers on the ride home so as to dispel any perception of inequality.

It was a pointless exercise.

He knew that, contrary to everything he’d hypothesized up until that day, everything would be completely reversed; that beginning with the moment he’d stepped away from her grave, every day would be longer than the last.

[Jamie Hogan]

This one and Galen's...you guys are really delving into some heavy, heavy psychology. We are fortunate that you in particular can be trusted to delve, and to deliver it back to us with so much heart. Fantastic, Ron.

[Kristine_ES]

oh. the twist at the end... this did not lead where i had been immersed, and that's a good thing, really.

 

[bolton carley]

oh, how sad.  and so true.  i was reading that thinking how i'm the exact opposite.  i love the drive there, anxious and looking around outside, but i hate the drive back.  i hate leaving.  

this piece is poetic and the elasticity and pointless exercise says it all.

[Bill Floyd]

Time's elasticity has rarely been so powerfully evoked.  I, too, like that you puzzled over this and gave the phenomenon its due.

[Gita]

You are wise and perceptive.

[Angela]

Strong statement about beginnings, endings and the point of the journey.  Well done.