He sat for a long time on the red rocks gazing over the limitless blue horizon. The distant crashing of the surf floated past his senses like a warm mist and filled him with the sadness of lost days he now could not fully recall. The pungent and salty air was infused with the lonely scattered cries of the gulls as they swooped and cavorted in the dimming evening sky. Their annoying cries were becoming transparent and harmless as the he sank deeper into his thoughts, deeper into his solitude.
The glowing and burnished sun's disk was half consumed by the darkening waters and it painted the cotton ball clouds pink and violet and red as they escorted the star to it's next day's duty on the other side of the world. The fading light would have been overwhelmingly sad but the old man suddenly remembered the song that he had been struggling to play in his mind. He sat more straight, the slump becoming less, his face brightened slowly, then with increasing warmth against the cold night air as the music filled his memories and lifted his feelings of loneliness..
With this recaptured melody now firmly escorting his memories to places more fond, his hours of sitting on the cliff were done, and he slowly and stiffly rose to his feet. The dusk was heavy now with gloom, and yet the shift in his perception was one of hope and wanting to continue. That song, that melody, the wonderful times that he now was remembering seemed to make the shift in his mood complete.
The old man quietly pulled the note from his vest pocket, and read it once more as if to have it pass inspection of anyone who would finally locate his broken body from the cliffs below. A wan, soft smile folded across his heavily wrinkled face and he chuckled quietly to anyone who might have heard. "Not tonight, I think" were his softly spoken words. They fell quietly from his lips as if they were meant to last through the morning. "Not tonight".
The old man folded the paper carefully, and placed it back into his pocket. He surveyed the darkness, the faded colors now gone, and turned and strode with a bit more care in his step as he gently hummed the lost melody that had caused him to pause, and allow more time to be observed. He remembered the music, the memories and what wonderful things had happened during that magical time in his life so many years ago.
So tonight, this night, the music carried the old man back away from the end, and back to the journey of life. Certainly, there were more songs and melody's he would enjoy. As the old man strode into the night, he was now singing fully the song he finally remembered and it's notes floated back to the night as if to say good-bye for now. More living to do with more music to follow....
