text: The night was frozen. Snowflakes fell from the sky like silk strands floating in the wind. Puddles covered the roads and reflected the city lights like stars shining in the night sky. With little traffic, drivers went about their nightly commutes as if it were any other. Nothing about this October night in particular made it more or less significant than any other. I just dropped off my friend Tommy at his apartment. Tommy's a really great friend. The kind of guy that still loves you just the same no matter how much time has passed since you last saw them. We just got done seeing the new James Bond movie which had its premiere the day before. The Bond movies are just the kind of sophisticated, well written, action packed movies that fully captivate my usually short lived attention span. I love going to the theaters. Being twenty four years old and having served five years in the Marine Corps, the movies make me feel a sense of peace and wonder I can only get in those two glorious hours. Scratchy red seats. Armrests that make your skin stick to them from years of spilt sodas. The smell of unnaturally yellow, over-buttered popcorn. The lowly dimmed yellow lights. Purposefully illuminated stairs and walkways Thirty minutes of trailers. The occasional crinkle of someone ripping open their candy bag. All of the things that transport me back to a time earlier in my life where the world didn’t seem so dark. I could spend every weekend seeing a new movie and leave each time already planning which one I was going to see next. My car, which is the first brand new car I’ve bought, is a spacey, almost unnatural shade of gray. The kind of color I imagine an asteroid cruising through space on an infinite journey might be. I’ll never admit it out loud, but the car and its color make me feel like an astronaut, and when I’m driving, the places I can go are limitless. It doesn’t have leather seats, and even though they’re canvas and frankly not the softest at least they’re heated. My friends always comment on how good the stereo sounds and honestly, that’s why I bought it. Every time one of my friends says something like: “Hey throw on this specific song, I NEED to hear what it sounds like on your system,” it brings me a sense of joy and pridefulness I’ll never give them the satisfaction of knowing. Driving is something that makes me feel in control. I rarely ever take rides from friends and I’m almost always the designated driver. My friends poke fun at me for never drinking with them. I always rebuttal their well stated arguments on why I should drink with them with something like “Oh I’m just not feeling the best” or “I have to wake up early tomorrow to do something”. They can see right through my excuses as total bullshit, but since they're my friends they never really fight back. They just care that I go out and they don't have to pay for rides. Just maybe a meal or a dessert from wherever we end up. I’m too embarrassed to admit it to them, but I get anxious when I’m a passenger in any kind of vehicle. An incident during my time in the service has left me with an unshakable fear. I'm terrified that if I'm not in control of the vehicle I’m in it will undoubtedly lead to a gruesome and unpreventable death. Driving alone is like therapy to me. I can play any song I like, however many times I like. I don't have to worry that people will get annoyed that I'm rewinding a song because I wasn’t paying attention to my favorite part. I have irreversible hearing loss from being around fighter jets and helicopters that would roar and buzz past my work place in the service, so blasting music to the point where any person with regular hearing would be bothered by is normal for me. I also just recently got into listening to audio books, but I can never listen to them just sitting down on my couch. I become so easily distracted by the slew of other things I have to keep myself occupied there, so car rides alone have become the perfect place to escape into a great story. Driving north down the practically empty four lane highway I look out my passenger side window. I’m flanked on the east by the Hudson River and a sleeping but still lively New York City. A city I live a short thirty minute drive from. A city of endless possibilities. Hustle and bustle that never stops. Lights so bright and buildings so tall that even the sky during mid day seems to shrink in comparison to the man-made wonder which it blankets over. A city so close to me, yet I can't help but feel, is unreachable. After a brief moment of looking in wonder of what life could be like living in the city it hits me. I haven’t turned my music on since I dropped off Tommy. The slight ringing in my ears from the tinnitus the Marines gifted me says, “it’s time to put something on before the migraines begin”. I reach over to my small LED touch screen and start to scroll through the playlist I already have pulled up. Led Zeppelin? Nah. Rolling Stones? Eh it's too late. Something newer maybe? Drake? Meh. Adele? Too sleepy for this late at night. Wait, there it is THAT’s what I want. My finger lands on David Bowies’ “Space Oddity” “Perfect” I say aloud, as if saying what I’m thinking will make me feel any less lonely. The soft guitar starts playing and I sink back into my canvas seats surrounded by the best sound system I could afford. Pure Bliss. ***Ground control to major tom*** God I’m getting lost in this song right now. The lowly lit road, twinkling from melted snowflakes transforms into the infinite void of space, surrounded by stars, surrounded by nothing, just me traveling through emptiness on a journey in which I have no inkling where I’ll end up. ***Take your protein pills and put your helmet on*** I glance at the clock on my dash. “23:59” “Holy shit, is the clock gonna change at the end of the count down?” ***10*** “That would be too perfect no way that would ever happen on accident” ***Ground control to Major Tom*** “ But it would be fucking awesome” ***9*** Of course shit like this only happens when NO ONE'S around ***8*** I guess that’s the magic of being completely aware during a fleeting moment, you start noticing things that on a normal day would just breeze past your consciousness. Maybe this isn't that special and it just feels special because I only just happened to notice this weird synchronicity. ***7*** The more I think about it, the less spectacular the whole moment is starting to feel. ***6*** A wave of goosebumps overcomes me ferociously, like an ocean crashing on a weathered down shore. ***Commencing countdown, engines on*** I mean I like this song but not this much. I glance back at the clock. It still reads “23:59”. Alright, it might still happen. I glance at the road and the flashing red lights of an ambulance practically flying down the opposite side of the iced over highway catch my eye. A fleeting thought passes my mind, “I’m glad that’s not me in there.” And as quickly as the neurons that fired off that intrusive thought burst into action, more neurons fire fighting it off and I think to myself, “Why the fuck would I ever think something like that!? I should be saying a prayer for whoever's in there, not counting my lucky stars...” Sometimes my brain scares me. I have these terrible, terrible thoughts sometimes. Thoughts that shouldn't be there. Thoughts I’d never choose to have. Thoughts that feel like they’re from a consciousness that's not my own. ***5*** I look at the ambulance with eyes that feel coerced into showing sympathy. I can't believe my first thought was about feeling lucky to not be in their position. I feel my grip tighten around the steering wheel, just enough to notice my hands are sweating. After lifting one up and observing the darker wet spot that’s now on the “2 o’clock” position of my wheel, I reach over the center console and wipe the sweat from my hand onto the back rest of the empty passenger seat. ***4*** The light hits my eyes. It feels as blinding as the first light of the morning. The light that shines through when you pull the shades to the side and let that new day into your room. What is that? My eyes try adjusting, but all I can see is yellow and a dim but apparent flashing red light. Why does this ambulance have their brights on right now? Some peoples’ choices blow my mind. You're just endangering other drivers by potentially blinding them. I reach up to my visor and pull it down to hopefully block some of the light. “There we go, I can see again no thanks to this ambulance” I think as my eyes start adjusting to the new lighting. ***3*** The lowered light passes from my cornea, to my pupil, and then to my lens which shines it into my retina, and the photoreceptors there turn it into electrical signals which shoot to the optic nerve in my brain which turns the signal into the image I'm seeing before me. My brain tells me this process has happened too slowly for it to get signals to the parts of my body I now need to use to save my life from the image it just saw, interpreted, and decided was unavoidable. ***2*** The ambulance is facing me. Probably sliding out of control from the iced over road. This can’t be happening. Not me, something like this wouldn't happen to me. No, it COULDN’T happen to me. Right? The ambulance is going to regain control just in time and swerve out of the way. Yea that sounds about right, no way god would do this to me, I'm not done living life there's so much more I have to experience and do. I’m starting school in January, I’m going to study psychology and medicine and become a Psychiatrist. I have so many plans I’m just starting life after the Marines. My body stiffens. Like a dead rabbit after being caught in a hunter's snare. I’m completely numb. My jaw clenches so hard I'm amazed my teeth haven’t cracked as easily as a potato chip would. No, not tonight, I'm not going to die. If there's any vehicle to get into an accident with, it's an ambulance right? The EMTs’ in the back will be able to save me after this if I get hurt. How much time do i have left before impact. I can barely move. I take a very rough, quickly judged glance. There's maybe twenty five feet. “Fuck.” My foot is pressed down harder on the brake pedal than I thought my body could even accomplish. It feels like it’s going to go straight through the floor of my car and onto the slicked down icy road below. My leg is completely straight, pinning my back against the backrest and lifting my butt clear off the seat itself. One more glance. Fifteen feet. This is it, the moment of impact, please don’t kill me. ***1*** My eyes notice the snow falling through the air. Each flake is completely different. Completely individual from one another. The water molecules going from liquid to solid, form these weak hydrogen bonds to one another and create a six-fold crystalline structure which takes various shapes, the most common being hexagonal. Each Snowflake, like a human, uses the bonds it makes to keep itself together for a short period of time. People fail to realize how similar human beings and the water molecules that make up snowflakes really are. Both need bonds to stay intact. Both will eventually lose those bonds and return to their original state. After their bonds are broken, new bonds will eventually form. The cycle continues endlessly with the only constant being the original Person and original molecule. Both people and molecules go through ever changing states of existence while never truly being in control of what makes those changes happen. I close my eyes so the last thing I see is something beautiful. ***Check ignition, and may god's love be with you*** My eyes burst open. I’m standing in the middle of a road. There's an ambulance right in front of me. I can see it with the most clarity I’ve ever seen anything before this. Water, beaded up on the white hood of the car. The word “Ambulance” written in blue letters backwards so that drivers can read the word in their rear view mirror. The yellow head light illuminates the cabin. An older male driver whose overworked, dark brown eyes suggest they've just seen the scariest thing they could ever imagine. Mouth wide open, presumably screaming in terror and goosebumps lining the sides of his neck. He has a wedding band on. It’s golden, and just barely reflects the light from above from being covered in years of sweat and dirt. A band that clearly says “I’m worn by a man who does hard, dirty work for a living, and has always remained loyal to the promise of love that was given to another on the day he put me on his finger.” I wonder what he's scared of and why. Snow stays suspended in the air like ornaments hung on the branches of a Christmas tree. Floating blissfully for the viewership by any one to see. I reach out to grab one and my fingers pass through it as easily as it would if nothing was there at all. It’s still floating, unaffected and as beautifully intricate as it was before. What’s going on? I reach again. No effect. I turn around. There's a man in a car parked just feet from the ambulance. He’s white, but not fully, mixed with something else for sure. Jet black hair, beard, and mustache. Eyes forced shut, jaw clenching with his off-white teeth showing they’re being forced together so hard they might break, Cheek muscles tensed to the point they intrude into the space his eyes should be. Both his hands are gripped around the steering wheel so tightly it looks like he's trying to rip it off the dash and into his chest. I’m standing in the space between them. “That man in the car... that’s me...” “Where am I? Why am I here? What's happening right now?” “Why can I see myself?” I go to put my hand on my heart out of pure instinct but I don't feel anything. I can see my body, but I can’t feel it. In-fact, I can't feel anything. No Smell. No taste. No touch. No emotion. Nothing but Awareness. “Am I dead?” A voice speaks out and whispers gently through the deafening silence of the motionless night “Not yet.