By Patti Keiper on Thursday, November 28, 2013 at 8:53pm
::It happened so fast. One minute I was on a life line, being lowered to a victim we could see still struggling in the water, the next, I found myself here...
Where's here? I- I can't reach you, whoever you are, or anything. I- just want to open my eyes.::
(The voice of the other.) Your eyes are open. You're in the space between, Roy. Not quite just an idea. More like an extension of me. You're someone I took in from someone else's art and made as a compliment to his. I give you new days in your life to live but I always leave you true to yourself. I hope you don't mind but I couldn't let you die back there as a relic on a piece of forgotten film no longer viewed.
::I feel so ..rich, like I'm living a million lives.::
That's because I'm not the only one here. Others are sharing you, and Johnny, and Cap, and absolutely all the rest of everyone you know. They are doing the same thing I'm doing. We have a connection. Not just words or images. We influence each other, can you feel it?
::Can I? I'm doing so much. More and more every day, but I can't see what I'm doing until I'm there, in those moments. Is that possible? Sometimes I think I'm dying.::
Not for long. Not for real. Just in a moment. For one or two. But then you move on and change, don't you?
::Yeah. I think so, uh... Is it...going okay? I mean... my life, right now.::
You're alive, Roy, with us where we are. Don't doubt yourself or where you are, or where you're going. It's still your life. I, as another one, have a way to keep yours safe, no matter what happens by sharing some of your changing moments that I've been given to see, in the best way I know how.
::Do I know you? You are so familiar to me and yet I can't remember exactly when the moment was when we first met.::
Neither can I. But I've known you for almost all of my life, ever since I was a child.
::Are you happy? You feel like family, I should ask.::
No more or less than you, Roy. I feel the same moments and the same blindness about my future. In that, we walk the same path.
::We're both on the same rope.::
You could say that. Why are you smiling?
::Because I can see parts of what makes you bring me here. Your compassion.
Your vibrance. Your pain.::
There's no escaping emotions. *chuckling*. Not for either of us, I'm afraid. Do you want to know something from the Great Beyond?
::What? No wait, scratch that. Just tell me. I'll make sense of it all later.::
You inspire me. I became just like you with my work, in my job, many years ago. You were my teacher. Of a sorts.
::I can do that? I mean, past how I taught Johnny? A-And how Dixie taught me?::
Yes. You can. Like she did for you.
::That's amazing. So you're like one of my children.::
In that respect. And you are my reflection, of what I learn from your teaching about how, when, and where you live your life. How do you feel?
::Like I'm becoming more than just a firefighter paramedic on a rope.::