Out-of-the-Body Travel

Body and soul are linked as in a marriage, a sort of three-legged race team, and
are usually comfortable with this arrangement. If the soul is forced to travel
alone it does not wing its way over wide water, does not fly skimming the
treetops. No, the soul shuffles along like any body, eating at lunch counters,
listening to conversation in the bus station restroom … “Fifty cents? I think I
can get fifty cents …,” riding the bus all through the dark night, watching the
distant, singular lights go past, wondering all the while if this trip was really
necessary. Meanwhile the body sits, inert, staring at the TV, needing a shave, a
nail trim.