Yahoo! GeoCities - The Becky Ann Birkbeck Risk story

The Becky Ann Birkbeck Risk story

The Eclipse of the Barley Moon

               The nights of August are that of change.    Between the summer solstice and the fall equinox, August nights reminds us that the cycle of life never holds still, and that the summer is slowly slipping away.    The temperatures of the days are still hot, but the late afternoon thunderstorms brings cooler air to the desert nights.
               It's a magical time which brings to life, only for this short period of time before autumn begins, things that have waited for their time to flurish.
               There was a full moon tonight.
               To ancient farmers this full moon was known as the Barley Moon and it was a time to reflect on the eternalness of this cycle of life, while their crops were ripening in the fields, and they would perpare for the upcoming harvest and the next full moon, the Harvest Moon.
               And tonight, as things would have it, here with Becky, somewhere above the covers of the clouds was also a lunar eclipse, the legendary omen that is said to foreshadow the coming of disaster.
               When the time came for Becky to leave, there was no final get-together, no good-bye, no explainations.    I was shut out.    Buttercup-2, the mysterious phone by the pool, just rang unanswered and I was left standing, much like our ancestors stood in the darkening of their world as that ominous shadow devoured the moon, standing in wonder and fear - and powerless.
               Once again I was back in my dreams, waking to the fact that Becky was no longer here, the moving shadow of a dream.    Powerless to hold on, powerless to say good-bye.
               I was lost in the dark... groping around trying to make sense of all the things that I couldn't see.
               How could she just walk away without explaination or even a word?    Was there something that I had missed?    Was there something that I said?    Something that I did or should have done?
               I could see her pensive blue eyes; and over, and over, I wondered: Was I just too lost in them to really read what she was trying to say to me with them?    Why did Becky internalize her thoughts and not share them with me?    Was there something that Chris had over her?    Or was it me?
               I played everything over and over in my mind, trying to make sense of it... and nothing made sense.
               You can't have that much passion, as Becky had with me, and not have it mean something!    And if Becky was truly in love with Chris, she wouldn't have been there in my arms... she had asked me for the first kiss.
               And there was conflict in the words that she chose: Why did she marry Chris I had asked her:

               "Because he asked." She said. "You get to a point in a relationship where you either split-up or you get married, and at that time I didn't feel like I wanted to split-up. So, I got married."     Was there any true passion there in her words?
               And the words she had chosen in her letter to me:
"Chris is not an unfeeling ogre, as a husband tho..."     What kind of true love would choose those words?    Chris might not be an unfeeling ogre, but an ogre, none-the-less, seems to be implied by Beck.   And there was also her comment on how gentle I was.
               Yet... Becky left.  And there was nothing that I could do.
               When I received a letter from Becky, a few weeks latter, it was very nonchalant, cold, like nothing really happen, like it didn't matter, like her feelings for me didn't exist.    But she was also with her husband now, so what could she really say?    Then that Christmas I received a short note saying that she and Chris were moving out of state.    And all communication stopped.
               And throughout the years all my letters either were returned or went unanswered.    Until I ran into her husband's web site: "http://www.geocities.com/chrisrisk/index.htm"    It filled in the missing pices of time and the gaps in the information that I had wondered about.    But it seemed detached, bored, passionless, vain.    It had pictures of him, his kids but totally devoid of any pictures of Becky and that bothered me a bit.
               There is an old saying: "If you really don't want to know the answer, don't ask the question."    But there were questions that I needed answered, and only Becky had the answers.    And It was in this quest, searching on the net, looking for a way to open up lines of communication with Becky, that I discovered her husband's second web-site: "http://members.tripod.com/crisk/"    and his two sections that he had there about Becky: "Becky's Devotionals" and "THE POTATO CHIP WOMAN!!! See the ghastly sight of shocking horror"    Both seemed sarcastic and belittling of Beck and not what you'd expect of a devoting husband.
               So with the help of a few friends we sent Becky a letter campaign.    And it was with that I reopened lines of communication with Becky,    And after the first few cautious steps of communication, was some of the most open and honest sharing of feelings that I have had from Becky in a long while, and although it was not what I wanted to hear, it was the answers that I had sought.    And It was straight from the heart of my Becky.

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