Message In a Bottle

I circled the table again. The dark blue gun sat in the center pointing toward the window overlooking the beach. Silent. Final. I sat down, picked it up and checked the rounds in the cylinder. I'd kept it for this moment alone. Protection.


The pain had become intolerable. I finally understood what drives others to self destruction. It felt more like I was pulled to the moment; not really driven. It was a gravity, being pulled downward; a grave.


I pressed the cold muzzle to my temple without much process and silently looked out the window, over the water and to the horizon where the sun was now setting. My thought:

'If there is Anything out there in the universe, anything that can give me at least a foothold against this unbearable pain, tell me now'.

The pad of my index finger was firm on the narrow trigger, the hammer cocked and ready to fall, releasing me to the Unknown. I stared resolutely across the water to the peach colored clouds around the setting sun. I was fully prepared for the final sting and blackness.

There came a faint tap stirring, unmistakably, somewhere in my tattered psyche. There was another faint pulse, something emanating from somewhere. I lowered the gun to the table quite sure of my inner perception. After all, my inner life is where I'd been living for the past several weeks. I'd purposely isolated myself in the beach house accessible only on foot or by boat.

I stood. I could always follow through if I'd been mistaken.

I walked out to the beach, processing what I'd just experienced. The water was calm offering a mirror to the orange and blue sky. There had just been a storm yet the beach was uncharacteristically clear except for a single plastic soft drink bottle gently rolling forth and back on the sand with each wave.

As I drew closer I saw that, though partially full of water, there was what appeared to be paper inside. I picked it up, removed the already loosened cap and poured the contents over my open hand. The paper stubbornly remained inside.

I returned to the house and cut the bottle open, carefully removed the soaked paper and gingerly unfolded a single page note fortunately written in dark crayon. It was dated at the top a little over a month old.

It had been written by a twelve year old girl name Deena and her younger cousin. They'd dropped the bottle and note some hundred miles to the south. It gave a mailing address and a simple message to notify them if the message was found.

Amused, I scribbled a note giving my own address and mailed it the following day, venturing out to village for the first time in weeks.

I began cutting and stacking firewood from the surrounding woods again, the bottle, the note and the events of the previous days still persistently in my thoughts. I felt fairly good and ventured to the post office each day and finally, among the junk mail and bills, saw several letters from the hometown from which the bottle had come. I opened the one marked 'Deena'. It was the excited patter of a small town kid, a full page inventory of pets, hobbies, friends and family history. The other letters were from equally excited parents and cousins, marveling over the journey of the bottle and note. Secretly, I had to agree. It may have saved my life.

I returned a note explaining that I was a struggling artist on a sabatical and shared my own brief history, burning the three piece suits, alcoholism, a divorce, a distant family, all hopefully vague enough to keep future enquiries at arms length.

The exchange continued remarkably for several years in which Deena poured her heart out to an unseen confidante. Her parents were in the midst of divorce and she was in the throes of adolescence with all the accompanying hopes, fears, dreams and pain. I could only offer encouragement and as much support as I could muster.

Through the years she finally met a boy from the navy and was married. Children followed and apparent fulfilment. I finally told her about the circumstances I was in when the message in the bottle arrived years before. It was obvious she was pleased at being part of such a strange and wonderful syncronicity. I had to agree. Some things defy our feeble attempts to quantify, qualify and explain. It seems, as an alcoholic, that most of my important messages have come in a bottle.