INCEPTION

.....OR DIE TRYING

Genre-Ghost story

The College for International Progress advertised themselves as a provider of a semester abroad for college students nationwide to over 40 different countries around the world, with language and local history courses, immersion with families and the promise of an experience of a lifetime. The glossy brochures portrayed a picture that appealed to Carl when he was at the student advisor office at Alhambra College in Southern California, and after heedingadvice from both friends and family that "you just have to go abroad your Junior year", he submitted his application.Typical to Carl though, he procrastinated and so by the time he applied, the programs to Ecuador and Costa Rica had filled. His third choice, Mexico, however had a spot available and so he took it. Carl was pretty excited about the upcoming plans as he felt his dorm life at Alhambra was kind of in a rut, devoid of any decent romantic prospects and with a kegger party scene that had grown quite stale.At a New Year's Eve party in his hometown of Denver while on break, ringing in 1992, the party seemed even staler, depressing and devoid of romance as any party at Alhambra that preceded it. The next morning Carl was sent by CIP in the mail a recommended packing list, course outline and a list of fellow students. Carl was the only male out of 10. "I like those odds" his dad ribbed him, and while Carl told his dad sarcastically to shut up, Carl liked the odds too. A romance in a different country sure appealed to Carl, still stinging from watching others besideshim make out as midnight struck the evening before.Carl was, frankly, kind of a loser with the ladies. He had a good sense of humor, was athletic, loyal, kind and reasonably smart, but he wasalso very skinny (despite eating massive amounts of food), had a big nose and recessed chin, and so was also devoid of the all important trait of confidence around females. What sexual experience he did have was notbeyond 2ndbase, and with girls he didn't really even like but was with because he felt he could do no better. Hormones, brain and heart were yearning for all of the attendant perksof an honest to God relationship with a sweetie. So with his mom's credit card and blessing, Carl stocked up on some new clothes, Walkman, and other things that would help form the first impression he gave.Upon arrival for orientation inMexico City, expectations seemed to be realized, as 6 of the 9 females werenot otherwise committed in a relationship, and all were crush-worthy in some form or fashion. A couple of these girls Carl judged were way out of his league on looks, but he had favorable first impressions of everyone's capacity for fun and friendship. One girl in particular, Hannah, had struck him as attractive, but not too attractive as to be unrealistic for him, and she just seemed to light up a little more than the others when he joked with her. Carl did feel a little intimidated as they all were from high powered New England universities, including Ivy League. No one was from a western college, and Carl felt after everyone told their mini autobiography at the orientation that he was outclassed in the IQ and accomplishment department. Nonetheless, they all seemed to laugh easily and an initial night on the town had been decent enough to maintain the optimism of what Carl hoped would be a turning point semester in his life.It didn't take long though for the favorable first impressions of the program to diminish significantly. The leader for the group was the daughterof a family friend of the program's executive director for the Mexico office of CIP, and it was clear that this leader, Angela, was in way over her head. A minor complaint at the get-go (once the group headed to the provincial capital of Guanajuato, where the group would be located that semester) was taken personally by Angela, leading to a reaction from one of the others, prompting more offense taken by Angela , then clinical forms of anxiety by Angela and then the first of many group meetings filled with drama, anger and tears. Within 3 weeks, the executive director traveled from Mexico City, without anyregard to the disaster borne of her nepotistic hire to give the "this is one of the worst groups..." speeches. An expatriate American liaison, Betty, who had connections within the community of Guanajuato became thede facto leader by reason of her being somewhat competent, but she was not happy about it and remained allied with the director. She jumped in to the "you are the worst..." camp early on, and the phone bill between the group leader, executive director and the expatriate must have been enormous as these group discussions always included how much they discussed one or other student's shortcomings prior to these meetings.Carl's romantic ambitions seemingly turned dire quickly as well. Carl obviously didn't give much thought to the compatibility of a steamy international affair with staying as a guest in a strange family's house for the entirety of the semester. You can't very well bring a girl to some stranger's house and tell the owners that the coat hanger on the door means "do not disturb". And, while Carl felt that he initially established his usual social acceptance with humor and willingness to go out after classes, that no one in the group really saw him as a boy they'd be interested in dating. The "I like those odds" assessment quickly became Carl internalizing his own perception that each girl in the group saying the clichéof "I wouldn't be with you if you were the last man on Earth." Carl's resulting tanking self-confidence as time went on, compounded by the strain of leadership dysfunction and verbal abuse, boredom, language barrier within the homes he was guestin, not really liking Mexican culture themore immersed he got in it and homesickness, all sent Carl into probably the lowest point emotionally that he may have ever been in.Carl wasn't alone in spinning into a funk, and the other girls in the group seemed to have shorter tempers, laughed less and seemed annoyed by Carl for reasons Carl couldn't understand. Carl consequently tried harder to be funny or fun initially, compounding most of the girls' annoyance to him promptingCarl to just check out emotionally from the group and withdraw into himself. On one occasion, Carl had addressed the rest of the group with "Hola chicas" upon greeting them onemorning, which seemed to make everyone bristle, especially Hannah that morning. Carl didn't mean to offend by calling the group somethingtoo close to chicks, apparently. In the group's defense, every female had become a little on edge by the machismo branch of Mexican culture and the constant cat-calls, including that very morning before Carl straggled in late to join the group. Carl's offense was easily forgiven by Hannah and others, they just didn't bother telling him unfortunately, as Carl didn't feel forgiven. He was especially saddened that he blew it with Hannah, as he had kind of focused his attention towards her as his only hope for romance. Now, he felt, whatever opportunity there might have been for finding a sweetie was over.Coping mechanisms were developed by Carl by March, which included Carl hiking, almost every afternoon, up a series of small mountains on the outskirts of Guanajuato. Carl used the time once at the end of whatever geologic formation he sought to conquer on any given afternoon to begin keeping a journal. He listened to his ever-present Walkman and shoebox full of cassettes that he kept in his daypack almost every moment he had free time (this use of the Walkman, combined with Carl's occasional use of profanity, especially irked the 3 headed leadership monster whenever Carl was singled out for criticism in one of the group meetings).The journal was not much a true journal as it was Carl amusing himself by relating the day's events in terms much more dire and angsty than how Carl actually felt and perceived the prior day's events. It was a form of reducing to writing a "it could be worse" scenario by journalingas fact that it was indeed much much worse. Carl amused himself with his hyperbolic depression rants and predictions for the future of failure, sadness and despair. Carl's favorite entry was not prose but art -- a drawing of himself at the age of 30 sitting on a greasy mattress on the floor of a decrepit apartment with a bare light bulb hanging by a wire from the ceiling eating beans from a can with a stack of porn magazines nearbycaptioned "what I have to look forward to". Carl dreaded the prospect of anyone actually reading this journal as it would be immediatelybe followed by a hospitalization if anyone read it as a true journal, so Carl kept the journal in his backpack next to the Walkman and cassettes never to be left from his side. Carl wasstarting to come out of his funk from his bizarre form of self-help, though not noticed by many in the group who had stopped laughing at their own "clingy Carl" jokes now that the clingy part of that joke was so apparently false. Hannah had grown concerned byCarl's sudden aloofness, and missed Carl's bad jokes and eagerness to go out after class. When no one else seemed up for going out when Carl was pushing for doing something, shewanted to speak up initially to just go out with Carl by herself, but she had similar opposite-sex confidence issues as Carl had even though Carl did notice her smile, heart of gold and quirky sweet tooth. Carl assumed Hannah was as uninterested in being with him as the rest, especially after the "Hola chicas" thing, and Hannah assumed that Carl had no interest in her by reason of his aloofness. Despite the hurt feelings that Carl hadseemingly no interest in her anymore, Hannah strongly felt that Carl was struggling, she just didn't know what to do next.On the first of April, one of the other girls in the group, Jane, justup and decided to bail on the programwith the student equivalent of a "take this job and shove it" moment. She was one of the "out of Carl's league" girls, but despite her superior looks, showed vulnerability and acted impulsively hooking up with boys she met at the town center a couple of times and not coming back to her assigned family's residence at night, or coming home drunk. As Carl had ruled her out of contention for romance, he felt somewhat brotherly towards her as she took constant abuse from the three headed monsterof leadership at every group meeting and often in between. The lead up to Jane leaving only darkened Carl's outward appearance with a flavor of anger to his aloofness. It seemed clearto him that the leadership sensed Jane's vulnerabilities despite the physical attractiveness and used her as their favorite piñata to make themselves feel superior. It was truly gross, and this aspect did not need any exaggeration or embellishment in Carl's journal. The next day after Jane's departure, April 2nd, the group was driven by the leader in a van to a remote agricultural town for a tour, which highlighted the relationship between the rural towns and the city of Guanajuato. Betty, the expatriate was along for the trip, and Carl could tell by her mere presence that the "meeting of all group meetings" to discuss "slutty evil" Jane's abrupt departure was on the menu for the planned brown bag picnic after the tour of the village. The dread within the remaining group was palpable andit was going to be a long day.Surprisingly the tour was pretty cool in that it was interesting. The entire town was agriculturally based and had a hippie-commune vibeabout it. While disturbing that most everyone in the village had state sponsored education stopped after 5thgrade, and the graduates had to find their role within the community to stay in it, the town functioned and seemed to get by. The tour became boring once it focused on sightseeing instead of history. Hunger set in and as the group approached the van to retrieve the sandwiches and pop for the lunch, the dread of the upcoming meeting returned and everyone was cranky.Near the van was a broad cottonwood tree and a small grassy area to sit comfortably to eat, and this became the forum for the meeting on Jane. It didn't take long for Betty to start in on a rant about Jane, followed by a rant about how she thought Carl was next with his poor attitude, reclusiveness (borne of"cowardice") and general mopiness, followed by a rant about how a couple of the others in the group didn't respect the culture, blah blah blah. Carl had determined before the meeting to defend Jane, but scrappedthe idea quickly. Jane didn't need his defense, she had bailed," God-speed Jane and take me with you next time,"he thought to himself. The accusationby Betty that he was a coward did sting, but Carl decided to just stare off and leave the accusation be.Carl instead chose to enter into a somewhat meditative trance that was quite effective at blocking the resulting back and forth between Betty and some in the group who had more resolve to fight. The tears of the hyper-anxious group leader only added to the symphony of aural torture, and Carl's effort at blocking out the noise only increased. The resulting look on his demeanor, complete with furrowed eyebrows, a slight flush and balled fists belied what was actually a not unpleasant meditative trance. His demeanor did cause Hannah to become concerned again that something was not right with Carl, almost to the point of saying something. Betty's tirade against Carl seemed especially biting this time to Hannah and Hannah felt that it left a mark. Hannah was about to defend Carl both because the attack was mostly unwarranted and also because it might get Carl to notice her again. Betty however then took a shot at Hannah's character, while Angela gave Hannah a tear streaked "evil eye", and Hannah's attention was drawn back to self-preservation.From Carl's vantage point under the cottonwood tree whilst in his trance (completely nonplussed at whatever jibberish Betty directed to him or anyone else), he was looking across an irrigation canal to a field of lettuce where some of the town folk were harvesting the heads of lettuce with curved sharp blades and collecting the heads in nearby baskets. The view of field itself was very pleasing with the neat rows of green and the footpaths/irrigation ruts in between the plants. At the far end of the field were two brightly decorated crosses that seemed out ofplace in some ways, but totally quaint in other respects. After over 2 monthsin Mexico, Carl ceased to be amazed at the demonstrations of worship to the Catholic Church at the most random of places. That a field of lettuce was so blessed by the Pope, Mary, Jesus, the patron saint of lettuce or whoever just added to the charm of the view. A train track was immediately behind the field, and beyond that lay a grove of trees, and beyond that a vista of the hills outsideof Guanajuato that Carl had become intimately familiar with. The distant sound of a train caught Carl's attention and he turned his head rightto see the distant train approaching on the same tracks that were behind the fields. Carl looked back at the field, when Carl leapt up out of his trance and yelled "No!" pointing to the tracks behind the field.On the railroad tracks behind the field was a small boy just sitting inharm's way without a care in the world, oblivious to the approaching danger. Betty yelled "What on earth?! Sit down!" and the rest of the group looked at Carl like he had 12 heads. Hannah popped up too to try to understand Carl's sudden outburst, when Carl then heard a scream from across the irrigation canal from one ofthe workers, obviously the boy's mother, and saw the mother run towards her boy.Opting to join the mom in herchase and leave the group behind wondering, Carl took off and leapt the canal, landing in stride on the far bank. Carl was at a dead sprint, and the physical shape he was in from the many afternoon treks up the hills behind Guanajuato were serving him well for this moment of truth. Carl continued to point and yell, trying to get the attention of the other workersin the field. Carl could only yell "the train!" in Spanish, unable to recall the words needed to sound a proper alarmin Spanish. The other workers in the field only looked at him with the same bewilderment Carl's group had looked at him with immediately prior. Anger briefly flashed as Carl was in disbelief that no one was coming to the aid of the boy and his mother, let alone show that they were remotely aware of what was even going on. Carl quickly caught up to the boy's mother,who was running slowly from being stiff working in the field and being a little overweight. As Carl passed her ata dead sprint, Carl scanned side to side and realized that even if he got one of the other field worker's attention now, Carl was the closest to the tracks and Carl was already running. It was up to Carl to save the boy, and Carl began speaking the mantra of "oh shit oh shit oh shit...."The phrase associated with imminent death of "your life flashing before your very eyes" must relate to the phenomena of a brain hyped up on adrenaline to process a million different thoughts within seconds. Carl was about 40 yards away from the boy by the time he overtook the boy's mother. Between that point and the point where Carl was going to takehis final stride for the jump/grab/Superman dive, Carl constantly calculated estimates between when the train would hit the boy and when he would get there to save him (it was going to be about a tie, his brain told him). Carl also thought "this is it" referring to his life, a pang of sadness at his parent's receiving the dreaded phone call, thoughts of chickening out, realizing that having a front row seat to the violent death of a young boy was a fate worse than death, how he was being perceived at this very moment by the group of girls, whetherhis fate of involuntary asexuality would be finally altered and even the thought of his story in the Reader's Digest section on Everyday Heroes crossed his mind. This last thought resulted from Carl realizing the closer he got to the boy that there'd be a couple seconds to spare before the train got to the boy. He was going to make it. He was going to be the hero.Carl surveyed the tracks immediately before where the boy sat,still oblivious, and determined where he'd plant his left foot for the Superman leap and grab. Carl felt a little tightness in his hamstrings and could definitely feel his body screaming out to stop sprinting because it was almost maxed out, but he was good to go for the last few yards. Carl timed his stride and perfectly planted for the jump when, as he was jumping, noticed the boy was no longer there. Carl also felt a grip stronger than he'd ever felt before on his shoulder that not only stopped his momentum cold landing him on the train tracks, but also spun him around 180 degrees. What Carl saw next made no sense but was sickening. Carl looked down on the mutilated bloody corpse of the boy hewas trying to rescue laying at the feet of the boy's mother. The mother was holding the knife she used to harvest the lettuce heads when she hissed in Spanish "you're too late!" before using that same knife to slit her own throat. It was the last thing Carl ever saw. The impact of the train caused Carl's head to whiplash into the front of the train, killing Carl instantly. And if the brain injury wouldn't have gotten Carl, the massive internal bleeding Carl sustained from the impact would havedone the trick shortly thereafter. The front of the train was a slight invertedV for aerodynamic purposes, and as Carl was slightly left of center of the point of the V, Carl's body was thrown forward about 30 feet and slightly towards the field he had just ran across in full view of the horrified student group and field workers. Carl would have been thrown forward even farther, but the momentum of his mangled dead body was broken abruptly as he wrapped awkwardly around the first of the two gaily decorated crosses Carl had seen earlier - crosses memorializing the tragic deaths on April 2, 1985 of a boy run over by a train and the immediate suicide of his distraught mother.Carl's parents did receive the dreaded call from Hannah, who had taken it upon herself to reach out to Carl's family and explain as best she could the dysfunction of the program,verbal abuse by the leaders, and how, after reading his journal, all this had seemingly affected Carl more than anyone had realized when Carl had decided to take his own life.