Weirdyear: 5/31/11

E.S. Wynn

VISIONS OF LINCOLN
By Justin Short

I had my first vision of Abraham Lincoln when I was sixteen.

I was doing something mundane. I won’t lie and say I remember what it was exactly. Probably making toast, feeding the dog, changing my wiper blades. An activity so dull it hurts. And it happened.

Next thing I knew, I was on the ground, my vision reduced to black and white. Meandering in front of my eyebrows was a nickel-sized Abe, carrying a parcel of letters and humming something. He looked more like a creature from a horror film.

The Penny and Five-Dollar Man.

Honest Abe the cannibal.

Ye Olde Skull and Rail Splitter.

Didn’t let it bother me. I mean, stuff happens. I wrote it off as an extremely-vivid daydream. And besides, the image didn’t repeat itself.

I mean, not until graduation. And this time around, I was witness to a nineteenth-century explosion. I was literally holding my diploma, vaguely looking forward to tossing my duct-taped cap into the rafters.

Before I made it to the cameraman, my knees lost power and I stumbled into the auditorium wall. Crunches and rumblings rang out like the world’s noisiest train crash. The echo filled the halls. My sight was a spiral, log cabins and creepily-distorted top hats twirling. A nightmarish tornado.

Thoughts flew across without explanation. Great Britain has King Arthur. Italy has Julius Caesar. We have him.

His face swirled out of the mess of hats. Those ears rippled, and his reflection settled. This time he held a monocle. His mouth opened and closed in speech, but I couldn’t hear what he was telling me.

I woke up underneath the bleachers and soon rejoined the crowd. Commencement’s a confusing time, no doubt.

            Now, somehow I managed to make it through my college years without any Lincoln-related disturbances. No more than normal. Occasionally when I closed my eyes, that bright green afterimage would be in the corner of the darkness, beard and hat and all. But, you know, that stuff happens to everybody. Just a little reminder that your retinas have been burned or something. Think that’s the scientific explanation. Never cared enough to research it.
            Anyway, I was getting used to normal life. No more presidents. I guess I was enjoying the finer things and what-not. Like romance. I’d been hanging with this girl since before college graduation. Eventually we realized we, you know, loved each other and all that. I was considering a proposal.
            On the night I decided to finally make the trip to the jewelry store, I headed downstairs to turn the lights out. There he was in my recliner. Quite a sight: a six-foot-tall man clad entirely in black, lounging in my favorite chair with one enormous leg crossed over the other. He was twirling his hat around two monstrous fingers. “Evening,” he said.
            I nearly jumped through a window in my panic. After a dozen nose-breaths, I miraculously composed myself and made my way over to the couch. “It’s been a while, Mr. President.”
            “Finish it,” he said.
            “Finish? Finish what?”
            He nodded, apparently not understanding the question, and leaned back in the seat. He kicked his legs up with a satisfied yawn. A second later, he was gone. My eyelids were stained with a single image: the memorial.
            Like pilgrims hot-footing it to Mecca, I prepared and made my way to D.C. Ignored the other attractions. Headed straight for his statue. My toes curled as I walked that final stretch of sidewalk. Finally I saw him, all marbled and enormous.

It was glorious.

I really wish there was more to the story. I’d love to tell you I went to the memorial and had an epiphany, found the answer to the mysteries of the post-Lincoln universe. The pilgrimage told me who I wanted to be. I reached a state of emancipated nirvana.

None of that happened.

The visions stopped, however. I guess it’s safe to say the monument changed my life.

I return every year. It’s my tradition: a week-long vacation on the National Mall. I camp in hotel lobbies, sleep as little as possible, and spend dawn to dusk staring at that face.

I did get married, by the way. Wife wears glasses now. She wouldn’t let me name him Abraham. I convinced her it worked as a middle name, so I call it a win. I suppose I still love her. At least when she questions it, that’s what I say. We get along alright, even though she complains about the haze I’m in for fifty-one weeks every year.
I only truly live when I see him. Standing on the lawn now, I recite those words so eloquently etched above his head:

IN THIS TEMPLE

AS IN THE HEARTS OF THE PEOPLE

FOR WHOM HE SAVED THE UNION

THE MEMORY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

IS ENSHRINED FOREVER

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Justin lives in the midwest. He spends his free time juggling, picking locks, and staring at walls.