Cherry Bite

A short story

                                            

I feel exposed, naked, peeled, and defenseless like never before. What is this state I am in?   I never felt this open and vulnerable in my life and the weirdest thing is, I don`t mind feeling this way at all. Most of the times I am preoccupied with doing something, reflecting on past or future.  I do not ever feel quite ready as usual; there is never enough practice or preparation i say, as a rule.  But right in this moment, I feel unplugged and enterable, awaiting new sensations, I feel ready. Prepared for unexpected. Just like I felt when I was child. That must have been the glass of cold cherry juice I drank to quench my thirst in this summer night. On the spur of the moment, I am reminded of the time when I climbed the cherry tree for the first time and had the taste of my first cherry.

 Sweet cherry pie! Yes, I remember the sensation of eating cherry for the first time. You think you know how it is going to taste in your mouth and you are somewhat prepared for the taste. After all you think, it must taste like other berries right?  But then you take a bite, you startle from the deviant taste of sweetness immediately followed by the strong current of sourness that delivers your senses mild electroshock in the way that was in no way anticipated. You realize how mistaken you were, how you never experienced anything like this before.  Only the untouched, new, previously unexperienced taste can take over your senses and your emotions. The cherry is now in control, even for a brief moment, yet still enough to remember the very first encounter with it for the rest of your life. You instantly revise all the categories of taste sensations and realize that taste of cherry requires a brand new category, a very name of its own. I called the taste cherry bite.

-You had to be there again- interupts my inner voice.

-Where? I wonder.

-The place where the sound is born-

-Does not make sense-I say

-Never mind,- my inner voice replies discouraged.

-Oh no!

- It is not the sound this time- I say,

-It is the taste of cherry that prompted this feeling in me, I promise.

 I feel impelled to relinquish self-control to the sensations that are taking over me instanteusly, cutting me loose from the worries of future, past and even the present time.  It is the cold breeze in a warm summer day.

It is this flow, you know, I feel it. The micro wind that blows nearby my skin, vibrates at the top of it and invites my body to follow its musical beat. It touches my skin slowly, a friendly push you know, like when a friend pokes you slightly as an invite to dance. My nose is getting cold and suddenly i am still.  I am attending to the sensation. I am there. It is as if my attention has left my head and traveled down to my body just to listen to the dancing air that surrounds me. Fluttering winds dance their way right through my skin, electrifying it, expelling the warm streams out from my body. The trembling winds find their way back inside me again somehow and I am in this sensation. Every dancing wind, every chill, every shiver makes my heart beat faster and slower at the same time. Times stands still. I do not know which feels better the cold dancing streams that pressure my skin and break right inside or the heat butterflies that pushes the dancing winds right back outside. Would I be able to feel one without the other? I do not want this sensation to go away so I try to remain silent. Suddenly, the thought hits me head and I cannot help but wonder what if I`ll never feel this way again. Perhaps the feeling vanishes leaving me with the memory of it, just like the memory of eating cherry for the very first time. You know how they say you only get one bite at the cherry in life.

 A sad truth

- Says my inner voice with a half pinch of a salt and a half pinch of irony and continues-

-So you went back there again?!

-Only for the memory, I swear! I replied

-Only for the taste…            

Reviews

[Devons]

This is quite an interesting and somewhat unusual piece of writing - particularly in the fact that it is consumed solely with an experience of a feeling, and something which perhaps in real time lasts no more than a few moments, if not less.
It reads well enough that the reader (at least me anyway) is carried along with its thought processes without any sense of real fatigue. It is ever reaching for an understanding or grip on what is happening, and explores through subtly desperate thoughts an exposition of that feeling. I have always thought that a feeling in itself is literally impossible to define (only attempt to describe or interpret). A feeling is faceless, imageless, unseeable, as it were, and all the complexities come through with the questioning labyrinth of thoughts presented in the writing. But most important of all is the sense of transience it instils, as though a beautiful butterfly (figuratively) passes through us and is gone again in the same moment, too fast for our grasping. Perhaps it would be a paradox to think we could manage this grasping. But it is a tragedy somewhat that we are unable retain the feeling. I very much identify with that impression, and I think it comes through strongly in this piece.
And I like the "inner voice".

NB there are a few small errors in grammar. They aren't particularly significant, but it would take too long to find them again and list them here. Just a re-read should highlight them easily enough for you to make the required amendments.

[Entranced]

Thank You for the review. You have my appreciation. Voice of Reason :) I have never read a review which is a piece of art in itself. I have no words. You say it is a paradox to think we could manage this grasping and yet you manage to do it with grace. I agree with you that in real time the feelings last not long. But what if we could stop the time for a while, free ourselves from the background voices of reason, logic, inner and outward ones and just be there in the transcended state of being...Vision is indeed major sense in use, but what about the touch, smell, hearing and taste? And yes, i think too it all is an interpretation and description but literally. How can we ever know unless we try :)
NB thank you i will correct the errors. I was so excited about the website i posted without edition. And also english is my fourth language and i would myself be surprized if there were no mistakes. It does not make it valid excuse for errors though.

[Devons]

Well, I assumed that since you are from Norway it was probably your second language - but your fourth?? That makes your English seem all the more impressive. There are many born English-speakers who have much lesser grasp of the language! What are your others?
The subject in question is perhaps far too complex to discuss here - we would end up filling this page with discussion!

[Entranced]

My first language is georgian, then russian, as i was born in Soviet georgia, norwegian and english. Thank you my friend! But i feel for english the most, somehow always did. Probably because of the inherent flow.. Do not know

[Devons]

I am continually being educated - I never knew that Georgia had its own language! You have slightly similar views to Joseph Conrad when it comes to the English language: he kept learning new ones until he found the best to write with. The trouble is, English is so pervasive now that it leaves us English with little incentive to learn new languages! Especially me, I'm poorly disciplined when it comes to that.

[Entranced]

Every day we learn something new right? I guess there is something about english, universal, deep and light at the same time and thing i love the most: the ambuguity it allows for. At least this is how i feel and have experienced.

[Coyote Poetry]

I don't know.
"Perhaps the feeling vanishes leaving me with the memory of it, just like the memory of eating cherry for the very first time. You know how they say you only get one bite at the cherry in life."
I believe if we are lucky. May not be a cherry. We will enjoy many new and sweet things in a life. Better to be hopeful and be able to test life and boundaries. I enjoyed your thoughts. You made me think tonight.
Coyote

[Entranced]

Thank you kind friend for the review. I absolutely agree with you. One should always try to seek new experiences that the life has to offer.

[Coyote Poetry]

You are welcome. Testing life when you are young. Leave old age with pleasure memories.

[Willard Wells]

Very nice piece. I was tasting cherries in my mind being reminded as I read your work of the taste of cherry in my mouth. It was almost a love poem of memory past of your relationship with "Cherry Bit". creative and fun. Thank you so much for sharing a fun work.