“Restless”

by Raven Eades

February 11, 2005

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I woke up with the distinct feeling my body was somewhere else.

It's one of those sensations that's really hard to describe. There are mornings where I'll wake up, just before the alarm goes off, and I can hear the traffic rushing outside my window - the world already in motion. Somewhere deep in my head I already know I'm aware and that lying a-bed won't do any good... but part of me just wants to stay there, lingering in this not-dream, not-conscious space a little longer.

That's how I woke in this strange place. It was grassy - hill upon hill of bright summer's cheer and vibrancy. The mild wind rushed through the copses with childish exuberance - dancing up one hill before tumbling down another. It was like watching the rabbits play.

Somehow I was wearing my summer’s dress - the cool, breezy one that made me feel more like a princess than a girl enjoying a rare day off. In the wind, the fabric fluttered delightfully, and I’m afraid unless you’ve worn that kind of dress, you won’t quite know what I mean. My hair had also been tied back, keeping it out of my face while I watched wide eyed the fields around me.

I suppose I stood up without realizing it, trying to get a better view. All I could see was a sea of grass with flecks of brilliant color - like wave crests. Even the wind rushing through the plant life gave the illusion of moving water, green, green, green waves of water rising up, down, rushing through the hills, kissing the sun and the air, giggling at secrets beneath their depths before tossing them up for a momentary glance.

The air was the sort that you couldn’t help but breathe in deeply. It almost seemed to wake you up better than a cold shower or scrubbing of your face in the morning. If it was possible, it felt like the air contained life - not that cheap imitation that we have down here, but real exuberance and energy that you only get a hint of in the lonely places far from civilization. It was like I could run fifty miles without getting out of breath, even though I had only spent a few minutes breathing that air.

Am I dreaming? I couldn’t help but think. Is this my Narnia? Have I found a place to come home to? The thought was almost too strong and full of joy to bear. How nice it would be to come home even after so short a time on earth. I was only nineteen, barely a fifth of a century old. By human standards, not even begun to live; by standards of eternity, not even half a breath. But I was already so tired... already it felt like my life was just an endless drone of work, school, work, work, work, boredom, work, work, work.... Already it felt as if I was seeing the endless cycle of my days ahead of me - a series of weeks where I was chained in place by set responsibility, set obligation, set boredom that I simply could not break. Already it felt like my passions had somewhere been spent and I couldn’t find the paths that would regain them and give me life. I knew that it was God that would give me the life that I needed - the passion that I so desperately sought - but somehow I seemed to have lost him in the turmoil of the endless, daily drone that I couldn’t escape. Somehow I had missed him and now it felt like I couldn’t find him.

So I hope you’ll understand it when I say that all at once I felt intense happiness and intense despair - that maybe I had finally come home or that maybe it was just a vision and I would soon wake up and find... my “life.”

“But if it is my Narnia,” I said out loud, for it seemed a little more comforting to hear my own voice in this place, “where is Aslan? After all, it’s Him that made it so wonderful, just like Lucy said. It wasn’t the talking beasts or the wonderful places or people - great though they were - it was Aslan. If I am in Narnia, then where is He?”

The wind just kept blowing, that same cheerful, silly wind through the grass-sea.

“I wonder,” I said, “If I am going quite mad, or if I’m writing another story I wished I could get lost in. I wonder if this is just my own head - a vision so strong that I’m really believing I’m here while my body is actually somewhere else. Maybe I’m in some classroom where we’re ‘learning’ the great secrets of the world, becoming more ‘enlightened’ and ‘educated’ when all the time my head is screaming How does any of this matter? In the end we’re all just fools! I wonder if...”

She paused, and realized that she was crying. “Oh, if this is only a dream,” she said, “I do wish that I could stay here if only for a while. It’s so peaceful... and even if it doesn’t have Aslan, for the moment it’s enough to just rest and know that I’m away from the things that don’t seem to matter. ...oh, but I wish that there was Aslan. I know that I would love to touch him and see his great paws and hear that voice that I’ve only imagined in my head. I wish that I could see his eyes even if I had to look away because I felt so overwhelmed and ashamed. I wish that I could actually know what it would be like to receive a lion’s kiss and to feel that rush of courage when he breathes on me and touches me with his tongue. Oh! How I wish that I could find Aslan here! Because, as beautiful as the world or vision may be, they are never nearly as great as Aslan!”

She sat down again and began to cry harder into the folds of her dress. It seemed a very lonely place now - beautiful and lonely - with the chattering wind mindful only of its games and the tall grass sweeping through the hillside. With many false starts, she looked up to see if perhaps - oh! just perhaps - a great rush of gold was bounding down the hillsides, larger than a carthorse, than an elephant, speeding past the wind and tumbling it over - dashing toward her in a speed both terrifying and exciting all at once.

But he wasn’t. There was no golden blur, no wonderfully terrifying shape coming toward her. No matter how much she wished there was.

“Oh Aslan,” she cried, “how much I’ve wanted to see and touch you! It’s so much harder in this world to read these beautiful stories and yet know I’m not one of those lucky children to cross over and see your face! Sometimes I just hoped against everything that I would somehow find Narnia, but you never called no matter how much I dreamed you would. And the funny thing is, I’ve never stopped hoping to find Narnia, even though I’m far too old to see it now. Oh Aslan...”

“Dear child.”

I jumped and felt my heart begin to race so painfully fast, I was afraid it would burst. And I didn’t want to turn around. Maybe this is an eccentric way of looking at things but I had imagined so often entering that great world that it hurt more to realize I wasn’t there than the longing to find it. I had begun to hide away from the dreams just so I wouldn’t have to say good-bye and take the grown up view that it was all just fancy make believe.

I hope, then, that you’ll understand when I almost didn’t want to turn around. Because you see, everything was in that chance that it was Aslan behind me, that somehow my dreams might not be in vain. So many times it seemed if I could only see Aslan just once, I could have the strength to keep going through this world, even facing the mundane life that seemed inevitable, because I would know that Aslan really was somewhere. And that he had seen me and known who I was.

“Oh!” I said, still not able to get the tears out of my voice. “If you are only a phantom, an imagining, please just go away now. I couldn’t bear it if you weren’t real.”

The Thing - if it was really there - said nothing. And somehow I knew that it was me that would have to turn around. It felt like I would have to take that leap of faith that maybe - oh! just maybe - He would be there, just once. Oh, just once...

I turned toward the direction of the voice even though I kept my eyes shut. How did I want to do this? Did I want to open my eyes and see if maybe, possibly, he was there? Did I want to stumble toward him and hope to feel his wonderfully golden mane? Dare I call out one more time to see if Someone would answer?

“Oh,” I whispered, “if you are not there, I don’t know what I shall do. If you are not there, I don’t know if I will be able to make it at all, even if this world is a peaceful break from all the monotony and meaninglessness. Oh, please, please, please.... Please be there....”

I opened my eyes, praying that I would see gold.

And I saw nothing.

I could only stare a moment, open mouthed, staring, straining for something. Maybe if I looked hard enough, I could find Him. Maybe I needed the magician’s book and then I could turn Aslan visible again. All the golden flecks of flowers on the hills that caught my eye drove the stake deeper into my heart so that I felt like it was more badly fractured with each risen and fallen hope. Somehow hearing a voice - or thinking that I heard a voice - and then not seeing Aslan was worse that staying in this place to listen to my thoughts.

“Oh, Aslan,” I said again crying bitterly, “Why did I hear you if you are not here?”

“Because, child, I am here.”

My head shot up and again I saw nothing. “Aslan, oh Aslan, please show me where you are! Please, just one glimpse and that will be enough.”

“Dear child, I cannot. For this is not your time or your world. Not yet.”

“But please, how am I to live if I have not seen your face save only in my dreams? You seem no more to me than a ghost or a wistful fancy.”

“Dearheart, have you not seen it? I send you the dreams. I send you the fancies. The are the way that I can comfort you in your world and give you hope.”

“Then you have come?” she cried. “Oh, Aslan! Please, may I see you? Can I see you in my dreams? Won’t you, oh please, please, please, take me to your country?”

“Dear, dear child. I will, but not yet. Your task is still here and your place is in your world.”

“Oh Aslan,” she said, crying again. She did wish she didn’t cry so much, but at moments like this, it was really hard to help. “How can I wait that long if I haven’t even seen your face?”

Then something warm and gentle, surrounded her. It was like the breeze that she had noticed on entering this world - filled with life somehow making her feel like she could do anything after it had touched her. It filled her up and she almost felt like her eyes became brighter with the sensation. Then something wet touched her forehead, like a lion’s kiss, and she started crying even harder.

“I am here,” the voice whispered. “And now you are a lioness. For I have breathed on you and touched you with my strength. You may not see me yet, daughter, but I am here.”

“Oh, Aslan,” she said, scrambling to her feet. Wildly she stretched out her hands, sweeping them through the air before she felt them collide with something marvelously soft and furry. Leaning forward, she cried into his mane that she could not see. “Oh Aslan, must I go back, even if I can’t see you?”

“Yes, dearheart, yes.” She felt herself lifted, and somehow she knew the Great Lion was holding her between his paws. “But take comfort; I have known you before you ever knew me. And someday, I will welcome you home to Narnia.”