Shasta sunshine by Robert Libbey

​Shasta sunshine

My VA ID’s still good but my knee got a world better once I got off the processed food in the hospital, got my leave, and began collecting the cans: I dropped thirty pounds or so in the first year alone, but had to get used to the kids’ catcalls “Hey, can man!” and guys all torqued up in pick-ups trying to run me off the road into the brush; that was not cool.

It wasn’t for lack of trying: the gig at the machine shop ended up short-lived, once they brought in that 3-D printer. But with the military separation money in combo with the VA disability + the walking cash I got from the cans, I was fairly ironed out, though the only digs I could score was a basement room with little light, no view at all, so to be honest I started getting antsy.

Dr. Kahn was a life-saver, then: I skulked back to the hospital once a week to see her. I think she was Jewish, but I wasn’t anything, so I confessed my anxieties to her: how unlovable I felt, how no woman would ever, and how did I ever end up in this godforsaken place and whatnot, and she was placid as a lake reflecting back nothing but positivity.

I’m sure I was half in love with her; probably all in. She turned me on to reading: gave me my first book out of school, an easy reader, Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I was hooked. Reading opened up my horizons; Dr. Kahn helped me envision possibilities.

At our last session she said “I shouldn’t” but gave me a hug, took my palm and placed an opal—transparent, flecked with green striations—in its rough. “From Mt. Shasta.”

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Up Cosmic Wall I lead guided climbs in Castle Crags; easy ascents up Bolam Glacier on the north flank: the views, so clear. Spectacular.
 
Sure, some folks call it hokey; the crystal shops; the tourist traps. 

But out here I swear I can feel the lava tubes hum at the heart of Shasta; swear I can see my house: a tiny fleck nestled in the stand of pines—early morning my wife still sleeping, the baby too, in her basinet. And I know, there’s a path, not random—in the least—that by the hand, with love and kindness, led. Led me. Here. To my mountain.

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Robert Libbey lives in East Northport, NY. He has writing in or soon at: Cabinet of Heed, Ligeia, Spelk, Drunk Monkeys, Flash: The International Short-Short Story Magazine and other places. He is a reader with Literary Orphans.    

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