Love Story: In The Web of Life Ken Renshaw (the best novels to read TXT) 📖

hug, held me andsaid, "Thank you, I'll never forget that experience. But, now Ihave to visit the ladies' room."

I replied, "After I tie this bird down I amgoing to walk down to check out my sailplane trailer. I'll meet youthere."

I suddenly felt uneasy as my attention turnedto my sailplane. I closed my eyes, and saw, in a visualization, thevague outline of something scratched in the ground under mytrailer. I hurried to the trailer, and there it was. A symbol wasscratched in the hard earth under the back of the trailer; the samesymbol drawn in the dust of Candice's windshield in the parkinggarage. I took out my cell phone and took several pictures. Then Itook out my keys and opened the access door into the trailer.Nothing seemed to be disturbed. I checked the access door on theother end where everything also seemed normal. 'There might beprints,' I thought. When I looked closely, I could see the normaldesert dust grime on the trailer around the doors had been wipedclean. 'I'll let Dore's security service people know about thistomorrow.' I said to myself.

Then, Tina walked up and cheerily said, "Picnictime!"

The cold wind was coming up, driven by thewave-weather.

"We need a sheltered place for our picnic," Isaid. "We could go over to the patio behind the mobilehome."

Tina dropped her eyes and said, "Not today,let's go somewhere out in nature."

"OK," I said, "That wasn't supposed to be atrick. I know just the place."

We went back to the airport office and I paidmy bill and wrote a note requesting people inform me if Mr.White-male-Caucasian-five-five-stockybuild-grey-crew-cut-gold-rimmed-glasses showed up again.

"What was that about?"

"I'll tell you at lunch," Ireplied."

We drove up a dirt road alongside the airfieldto the end and then turned uphill on another steep rough dirt anddesert rock road. Near the top of the hill, we came to the ruins.There, only the stacked river-stone walls of a barn remained, theroof of which was long gone, with a cement floor and an open sideto the North where nearly all the rock wall had fallen. We wentinside to where the walls sheltered us from the wind and it waswarm in the sun. A clean, but weatherworn picnic table sat near thewall by a fire pit, which had apparently been made from some of therock from the fallen walls.

I explained that a glider pilot I knew hadcleaned the place up and used it as a place to park his RV when hecame to fly.

"It is a beautiful view," said Tina.

Looking away from the mountains toward theSierras, we could see the clouds were broken and spotty sunlightwas illuminating patches of desert. As the clouds moved, the desertseemed engulfed by waves of light and dark.

"Why is this here?" asked Tina.

"I have told you about the great, greed-drivendreams for California City up north from here. This ruin is anearlier version of that. Almost a century ago, there wassocialist-utopian-driven dream of building a planned city here. Thelogic of the idea was great, there was more rainfall then, sofarming was possible. But, some of the movement joiners were notdriven to do their share of the labor, and others were not drivento share their wives. The colony fell apart in a few years. Waydown there, at the bottom of this ridge, there are still some olivetrees, which have survived from that era."

Tina observed, "One has to be careful of whatdreams one buys into, especially if they are based on greed, orsomething-for-nothing, or other men's wives. In spite of all that,the energy at this spot is really good. Must be happy cowenergy."

She glanced at me, apparently thinking she hadgone somewhere she shouldn't with me.

"You are right," I replied.

Tina looked surprised and said, "I thought youdidn't believe in energies and things like that."

"It doesn't bother me now. There can be ashortcut is space-time to when there were happy people and happycows here."

"I am sorry I didn't pack any milk to drink. Wewill only have coffee today," said Tina as she started to unpackthe picnic basket. She gave me a mysterious smile I did notunderstand as she took off her down jacket.

Today, she had a different table setting. Thetablecloth was blue and white checked and the plastic plates werewhite. The tumblers were stainless steel and said Starbucks on theside. She set out a crystal dish of olives, celery, small tomatoes,and radishes. She unwrapped sandwiches.

"I was thinking as we drove up here that Icould write a narrative of the wave flight, all the turbulence, andthen the beauty, and the potential danger lurking a few feet away,and then some more turbulence, and a glide to a smooth landing.Then I could give it to my high school students and ask them to usethat as a metaphor to write a story about people interacting, teenage dating, ups and downs, for example."

I continued the thought. "I had never thoughtabout wave flying as a metaphor. I have certainly had someturbulent relationships, though.

"Lately, my life hasn't been ups and downs somuch. It is more like the overcast clouds of my life are unzipping,exposing a whole new blue sky of something I don't understand, andneed to explore."

Without saying anything, Tina reached in thepicnic basket, pulled out a magic marker and a napkin and wrotesomething on it. She pushed it across the table to me, put her chinon her hand, and looked at me with her impish grin. On the paperwas a big "A+."

"Thanks," I said. "Oh, I almost forgot tomention, I had a premonition that proved to be true today. Before Iwent to check on my sailplane trailer, I had a great feeling ofuneasiness and had a visualization of seeing something scratched inthe ground at my trailer. When I got there, I did see somethingthat alarmed me, a mystical symbol scratched in the ground. Thatsame symbol appeared on the windshield of one of my key witnessescar while she was in my office. Colson is having their securityconsultants check it out."

"Premonition, ok, extra credit for that," Shesaid nodding and adding raised eyebrows to her grin.

"I love the desert," she added. "This has beena wonderful day. I do have to