A Starry Night

Oh, no. It's not what I'm doing. I'm now in a ESL program, so that I had some assignments. And this is one of them. Our teacher brought a pile of magazines full of pictures and asked us to choose one and write an imaginary story. I chose one which is just a night sky. But the sky is full of stars; also it includes the Milky Way. They should have taken it through telescope.
Though the story is a imaginary one, it's really what I was thinking. The teacher said that it's "Very lyrical, ??? (I can't recognize this word) this a lot." But some people, including me, don't like the ending which was written when I was really tiry. I apologize for it.

- - -

Lying on the ground with my body totally surrounded by sand, my face is up with eyes open and looking at the sky, the clear sky without a moon, without other lights, with only the star, the cold air, and me.

There is no light nearby. More precisely, there is no light in my sight scope; from here to the skyline on every direction, there is only sand stretching to horizon. And I am lying at the center of the world with only me, sand, stars and wind in the cold air.

It is not so long after sunset so that the sand are still worm enough that I can use it to resist the cold wind. Up in the sky, stars are shining as they do every night. The Milky Way goes across the sky from one end of the desert to another end just like a bridge connecting the two sides. But I am under the bridge by only myself lying helplessly.

% % %

It was a normal afternoon. Just as every day, a few customers did not like what they got, some did not know the usage, several complained about the quality and we had some misunderstanding with a customer on their request.

I got off the car in front of my home unable to wait for dinner. I shut the door of the driver seat and stepped on the sidewalk – at least I think that I should step on the sidewalk. But my foot sank two inches into the soft sand. The trees on the sidewalk disappeared. The car was no longer behind me. The garden around the house had no more plants, neither fences nor grass. And I was heading my long long shadow produced by the setting sun lay on the place which was my home, my original destination.

The air is dry and the sun is boiling. I can hear no sound of car or bird but only the sound of sand when I step on it. Also, the wind blows up sands which form a dune and makes a loud sound. Those are all I can hear and see – wind, sands and sun. I am now in a desert thousands miles away from home after just a single step out of my car.

Fortunately, I have my bag with me which contains half a bottle of water and some snack I just bought for the night. But I can see nothing but sand, no people, no animal, no oasis, no clue about what should I do or where should I go to get back. However, it won't get better if I just stand here waiting, so I decide to walk. Though I don't know the correct direction, there might even be no correct way I can go to survive, I just head some way which looks good to me.

May be there are some thing behind the sand dune and I will see hope when I get on top of it. After telling myself this sentence nine or ten times, I stopped hoping for that but still keep walking. I can now see my foot prints line up extending to sky line behind me. Nothing else can I do but I'm now full of energy and willing to do something.

% % %

I stopped and lay on the sand after the sun totally sank on the right of me. The sunset was so beautiful that I found that I started to love this place. After the last ray disappeared and the sky turned from red to black, I stopped and closed my eyes to memorize the beauty of the nightfall. Then, when I opened my eyes again, I found that the sky was not dark any more. The shining stars made me drunk. I sat down and finally lay down to look at all the stars.

I can now see the Milky Way hanging on the sky of summer night. The center of the galaxy, which is the most beautiful part of the Milky Way, located between Scorpio and Sagittarius. I can see the red star, the heart of the Scorpio, beating. I can even hear the beating of the Scorpio echoing with mine, a Scorpion on the ground. The only difference between us is that it is in the sky with other 87 constellations but I am here lying on the sand alone.

Then I look up along the Milky Way to northern part and easily find the Lyra and the Aquila. With the Cygnus, they form the triangle of summer. The Lyra and the Aquila sit on two sides of the Milky Way. What grab my sight are the two stars in the two constellations. The Vega belongs to the Lyra and the Altair belongs to the Aquila. In Chinese legend, they are a couple. The Vega is a girl from a rich family and the Altair is a poor male farmer. They loved each other and eloped but were finally found. God permitted the marriage but made them live on two sides of the river. They can only see each other across the river when doing their own work. Vega was a weaver and Altair became a cow herder. On every July 7th of lunar calendar, magpies will come and make a bridge going across the Milky Way for them to meet each other. That's the only day they can meet in the whole year and their tears become the rain. It always rains on July 7th of lunar calendar.

The lunar calendar is usually about a month behind Gregorian calendar. And this year, it will be August 11th in Gregorian calendar. The Chinese Valentines' day is then coming soon but I am still lying here doing nothing to get back!

I jumped up and tried to yell out some words but failed. I could open my mouth but could not squeeze any voice out. Only hoarse sounds came out from my dry throat. Suddenly, my head hit something. It is hard so that my head hurt, what strange is that as soon as I was hit, there was a trumpet which started from far to near. Then I found myself sitting on the driver seat with my seat belt unfastened. I was sleeping and finally fell on the handle pressing the speaker.

I turned off the air conditioner which was continuously blowing cold air on my face, and shut down my car. It was not a usual afternoon any more. It was an afternoon of exhaustion which made me fell asleep and it was an amazing afternoon which gave me a dream which let me think about something I had stopped thinking about for a long time. It is a memorable afternoon that I finally knew what my favorite thing to do is.

I opened the door again, stepped out and shut the door behind me. I am sure that this time I am awake and heading somewhere I know. The sun is still in a low position in the sky so that my shadow is still very long.

Finally I am home. But I am not going to be bored tonight, not as all other days. My snack is going to be eaten outdoors when I turn off all the lights I can and lie on the grass looking at all the stars shining down on me and welcoming me to come to join them again.

- The End -