I mean it, where are we, and where do we reside? Sure I’m here, in my room, somewhere in India, floating through outer space, or something. But that’s not where ‘I’ am, I mean, where is this thought coming from?
In my head? Sure. But that’s vague, isn’t it?
I’m not asking some dull question like ‘who am I’ and ‘where do I come from’. I want to know, where am I?
I think I know. You see, there’s a corner in my rather unimpressive brain, tucked away in some dusty and unkept place, where I’m sitting. I have in front of me a table, and next to me a window. I look through that window from my comfy chair, drinking coffee, and watching the scenery. The beauty about the window is that the view is always changing, never staying the same from my point of view. It’s like a projection of colours upon every wall of my darkened room, illuminating shapes that carry feelings, voices, and thoughts. I look through the window at the changing faces and places, I’ll wave and say hi to the passing people, and then I’ll sit back down.
Without the light shining into the window I might never even know that I myself exist in there! I like keeping the blinds as open as possible. Why shouldn’t I? The light coming in through the window reveals my hands and feet, my waist and elbows if I twist them at the right angle, and even my nose, given the mood. It reflects the idiosyncrasies of my little room, and the more light and color that shines in, the more I come to see myself.
On the table, I write things down in my little book. I write about what I see and the people that come to knock on my window, like an indoor cat having a friendly visit with an outdoor cat, destined to forever share their thoughts through the glass. I come back to my thoughts that I’ve written down, often citing them as ‘experience’ when having to deal with the more complicated scenery. Some of these experiences have to do with the things I admire the most about the human spirit, like smarts, cleverness, sympathy, compassion, and trust. There seems to be entire chapters written about love, too. Though I have to admit, there’s nothing conclusive about that one as of yet. Every once in a while, there is a tragic feeling that overwhelms me, sending deep shades of purple up and down the walls, reflecting on the page that I write. Who I am inside is ever changing, the images on the walls and and words that I write in my little place will only ever be seen by me, because no one could ever really enter into me. Only their images can come in through the windows. It’s better than nothing, but on the difficult days, it’s the kind of thought that casts such a light that reveals to me that only my shadow ever really follows me on the inside.
The room is intangible though, for you hard-liners out there looking at me with the skeptical eye for being overly subjective in my words. If you want to know, the true me isn’t a meta-body in a meta-room in my mind, you boring person you. Actually, it was all a ruse to make you think of crackling colours and of complicated, pretty things. Did it work?
Doesn’t matter, really. I know where I am. I am between the hand that writes and the words that are written in my little book on the table next to me, in my tiny room by the most interesting window in the world. Colours bounce around in the unlit room from the flying shades of light through the glass, reflecting pieces of me that are written to the page and manifesting in a kaleidoscopic explosion on the walls around me.
I am also in my real room, in India, on Earth, somewhere on the x and y in the milky way, or whatever. Also special, in its own way, but impermanent and bound to change.
Where I permanently find residence is where the words and experiences and memories combine into one, inside my little room, from which I look out peacefully, sitting by my little table, on my comfy chair, admiring the combinations of light that rush through my window and straight into me. I’d invite you in, but I think we both know that you’re already there.
Just next to my flat is a long alleyway, narrowed by two tall cement walls. I can see down into it from the roof, where just below a giant lot is being excavated for the construction of a new, and rather large, building. Between that site and my flat are 3 metal sheets standing sideways forming a 4 by 8 foot rectangle, opened on one side. It’s covered by a tarp, which is held by red bricks.
It’s 1 am and I can hear Bollywood songs flowing from a small portable radio, barely even muffled by those 3/4 walls and tarp. Around 6 people are sleeping in there. It’s easier for them to live next to their worksite, and without an actual home I suppose erecting one nearby is the best logical solution to such a nomadic lifestyle.
During the day, this family, mother and father, with roughly 3-4 young kids, work hard to earn their living. Today the mother and father were building a small wall to hold water tanks, she would mix the cement and he would place the bricks. They worked together while taking care of their kids who, careless with the innocent joys of childhood, play around in the half-nude.
They are a family, like any other… yet so unlike any I have ever been exposed to. From my rooftop I admire not only their physical strength but also that of their spirit. They are hardworking people who can only hope that their children learn how to survive on their own in such an environment. It’s a peaceful neighbourhood, at least, so there are not too many dangers for the kids. School isn’t much of an option, so the brick laying trade will be their most likely jumping point if they are to grow.
Food, sleep, work, survival. It’s a rough and somewhat unimaginable set of circumstances within which they make their lives. One as myself easily marvels at the strength of the human will, am inspired even… there are so many variations of life that are unimaginably far-removed from what I grew up thinking the world to be like that I am often stunned by such awesome displays of determination and survival.
There’s no way to conclude such a blog entry… the reader can think about whatever he or she wants at this point. It’s not going to be of any help for me to say that I might want to take these lessons I’ve learned from these people and apply them to my own life. I wouldn’t want to sound so stupid or pompous, as if to pretend that I could even begin to understand the challenges they face… but sometimes, simply knowing that they exist is enough to alter anyone’s view of this world, for better, or for worse.
It began with a pause, followed by a moment. I focused in on the soft blue light reflecting off the surface beneath me, and to a seemingly distant white wall. It lasted all but 3 seconds, but in that time I felt myself traveling between worlds. I didn’t exist during the period from which I came, but I followed not long after my arrival. Consciousness. Where am I? Just moments before I had been alive and well somewhere else, somewhere real and chaotic, vast and exotic. Indisputably real.
In its glazed over state of arrival, my mind shuffled its deck and unequally distributed my cards. One by one the images entering my mind from my squinting eyes revealing fractioned elements of my life. My name, my age, my language. A picture of me emerged from the abyss. But where was I? Blue light, white wall, morning sunlight seeping from the window, carrying with it the sound of birds welcoming a new day. My mind placed my body where it lay; planet earth, New Delhi, Vasant Vihar.
Settled in my identity I recalled the depth and complexity of the worlds I had just walked in my mind, adjusting to the sudden shock of dream jumping. I lay looking up at the open window, closed my eyes, and tried as hard as I could to remember the dream world that I had just ridden from. Images of battles in a blood red sky, followed by a meeting with distant relatives and the intricacies of non-existent personal relations between myself and them… none of it made sense, but for that night they were felt so intimately that I am still convinced of their existence.
I sat up and remembered the void, the experience of traveling between subconsciousness and awareness, and it made me feel uncomfortable, as if life were but a series of moments we jump in and out of. I had about 4 different dreams that night, 4 different lives, vaguely connected to the 5th that I presently write from. Even in dream, life is but a transient river, flowing and taking ever new shapes.
I semi stumble as I walk towards the shower quietly toying with the idea that life never ends, that we’re just dream traveling entities who seep from one reality into another, forever fading in and out of worlds. For a brief second, I hope that this thought holds true, turn the water tap, and stubbornly continue along with this life as if it were my only one.
I don’t know how to deal with this anymore. I thought that after a sufficient amount of time, the society’s invisible would cease be ever so present in my eyesight. After a year and a half, I am struggling to place myself in the divergencies of wealth that exist plainly before me.
I’m sitting in a cafe right now with my laptop and a black tea. I came to Priya market with the intention of outlining a concept for a short story I had in mind, but I can’t focus on anything constructive. The cafe is lined with massive windows that allow me to observe a never ceasing flurry of activity outside, and I can’t take my eyes away from what I see. Priya is by no means upscale, it has a few nice restaurants, a McDonalds and a KFC, a spa, and a few grocery stores. It’s middle class at best, with the occasional super-rich sauntering carelessly during the evenings.
Right in front of me is a woman dressed in nothing more than a tattered sari, covering her head and face. She’s sitting by the window to my cafe, her hand stretched out quietly, with an old bag filled presumably with her belongings. Maybe her entire life is in that little bag, I don’t know. She looks up and around at the people that pass her by, and I myself follow her gaze. 6 beautiful young women wearing fancy saris walk by, laugh loudly (I can hear through the window), and with their heads held high walk towards the Italian restaurant nearby. Two young East Asian girls wearing high-cut leather boots and thick black jackets pass without a notice. A young boy of about 3 walks up with his mother by his side, stops, stares, and is promptly dragged away.
An acquaintance from my university pats me on the should just then and I’m taken away from writing for the next hour or so. As the conversation takes us from JNU administrative woes to the joys of living in a flat, I keep my eye on the never moving lady. Her hand remains extended in front of crossed legs, as if years of being in that position has made any deviation from it impossible. Then out of nowhere a woman dressed modestly comes up to her and bends down, hands her a small bag. I watch the lady show her gratitude with a bow of her head, avoiding eye contact at all costs. She inspects the content of the bag: some bread from a local market. She puts it aside, and re-extends her hand.
I wonder if she’s happy. I wonder if there are elements of life that bring this woman joy, or if the struggle for subsistence has overwhelmed any desire towards happiness. I just don’t know. I see a man and his family walk by, he’s clearly of Indian decent, but not Indian. He stops and stares at the lady, hesitates, and then continues moving on. Did he see someone he may have once known in this old woman’s face? Did he feel the desire to give her money, then change his mind? It leaves me wondering what exactly transpires in our minds between wanting to help and deciding against it. Why do we decide against it? Why do we continue walking by as if she never existed in such an evidently miserable state?
It brings me back to the question of humanity. What makes each of us human? As an individual, nobody is solely human… we tend to find our ientities through the discovery of our ‘selves’ through our interactions with others, where we then create the standards. Otherwise we as individuals would be nothing more than thinking animals.
She picks up her bag in one hand, with a walking stick in the other. She is blind. I hadn’t noticed this before. She fixes her sari over her exposed legs, and slowly, feeling each step hesitantly, she walks away from the one spot she’d been sitting in for the past hour and a half, or more. This lady cannot even see the faces that ignore her… I wonder if she can feel them.
The cobblestone boardwalk that lined the gulf sea stretched for miles as they strolled together toward nowhere in particular. The setting sun set the evening sky to a nice calm shade of pink, softening everything its light touched. They walked arm in arm, looking at the shifting colors of the store fronts and at the plethora of nameless people around them, each occupied with his or her own little storied life. They would occasionally sneak a comment about one of those people, creating their own little stories about the different sort of lives that strangers lived from their own. Lovers strolling, families with children, single men and women walking alone pretending to be unaffected by their lack of company in such a romantic place as Dahab.
Would you like to eat, he asked her, glancing over into her eyes.
Smiling, she replied with a silent nod as they turned towards the entrance.
The restaurant sort of just appeared out of nowhere, and without discussing whether or not it was the right one they simply entered, knowing that this was the place they needed to be. The place had an open-air design, lit only by candle light with a clear view out into the gulf that came splashing up to the table next to them.
A table for two, he asked the waiter, that one over there please, by the water.
Good choice, sir, said the young Arabic man, who motioned for them to make themselves at home.
They sat down facing one another. To their right was the calm boardwalk, filled mostly by a few off-season traveling families and backpackers, and to their left the sea with its last hints of pink sunrays rippling off its surface. Between them flickered a candle, sending shadows to dance across their faces as their stared deeply into each other’s eyes.
I never thought we’d make it here… I mean, I never thought you’d actually come. His eyes looked to around the very mellow restaurant. Pillowed seats adorned the ground, with small little tables to hold up the food. At one point, I thought I’d never see you again, he continued, I thought that… well, best not to bring up the past here and now. The important part is we’re here, and hey, look, the sea! This couldn’t be a better setting to see you again after so long.
She sat quietly, staring at him warmly, listening. Her eyes fixed into his, and he could see the candle’s reflection twinkle in her iris. She said nothing, just sat there listening to him speak the words he had wanted to say but couldn’t, about a past too close to the present to forget yet too far from the future to mention.
He caught how intensely she stared at him, and for a moment, lost his own train of thought. Getting lost in another’s loving gaze has a way of enchanting our senses into submission, and for that instant he found himself lost in his own thoughts about the past he had wanted to air out. Memories came rushing into his mind without order or control, sending him into a dizzying spin of feelings, thoughts, and emotions that had once shaped him. They were good memories.
She watched him as he faded inward from the moment, and smiled her beautifully crooked smile, wincing her brown eyes ever so slightly. Some part inside of him recognized that face she made, and it elicited a flashback to the early stages of their fated love affair. It was of when they had first stayed together, up in that flat in the sky. Their small room was nothing more than four walls and a washroom, located atop of a busy little slum on the outskirts of the city. They didn’t mind, it was not where they were, but the fact that they were together that mattered. She had made that face once before and it sent shivers down his spine thinking of it. They had stayed up late, not by choice by by impulse to keep talking into the night. They laughed together at the silly stories from their past that they had shared, touching upon the experiences they had in their short lives that made them the individuals that they had become. He remembered how they held each other tightly, as if to prevent any potential force from coming between their love. After an especially embarrassing story she’d shared about her time back in her home country he’d gotten a glance of her face from a ray of light coming in through their barred window. Her face had a thoughtful expression to it, and she caught him staring and then smiled her crooked smile, winced her eyes, and they took each other with the force only one who has been passionately in love can understand. Vibrations rocked through their bodies as they hungrily groped for one another in a blissful sharing of body and soul. A cool breeze entered the room, running across their tangled bodies that began forming beads of sweat. Hours passed, the breeze calmed, and the sun made its quiet debut into a new day as they finally unclenched their exhausted bodies from. Satisfied in the way only lovers can be, he watched her fall into a deep and impenetrable sleep, freezing the peaceful expression on her face forever into his mind.
Small waves crashed next to them as he returned from his thought. She remained there silently breathing in a puff from her cigarette, and withdrew her gaze from his only to watch a grey cat scamper by. He gave his head a little shake and wondered if she’d caught him shift slightly in his seat.
I had to leave, and so did you… he said trailing off, and she nodded as she sipped her water. They had been separated for so long, months after months, with little communication to speak of between them.After a few months of hearing nothing from you, I had started having these ideas, terrible ideas to explain why you were not responding to me.
In fact, those ideas had been so terrible that they had cut him off from his appetite, and had drained him from any desire to even rise out of bed. In his mind’s eye he saw her, so far away from their little flat in the slum, living her life away from him. She had not sent word for weeks at a time, and it drove him to answer the many question’s he’d posed to her himself. Was she seeing someone else? Was that why she wouldn’t pick up her phone at night, because he was there with her? Were they together right now, as he lay alone in his little bed in his little room. These thoughts took over him for days, weeks, months, until, one day, he snapped.
I snapped. Just like that, it was as if these thoughts unleashed a torrent of chaos inside of me, and whatever semblance of control I may have wielded over my very own will collapsed into disconnected shards inside of my mind. I remember how it happened so suddenly one afternoon… I could only focus on one point inside of my mind, and that was of you being with someone else, some stranger, effectively cutting yourself off from our past and our future, throwing it all away into the wind. It killed me, he said, unconsciously emphasizing the word ‘killed’. I broke down and started shaking that afternoon, clutching my chest I couldn’t control my body. I shook and shook, in my mind I could not erase the image of you in another man’s arms, I couldn’t get over the feeling of betrayal that I forced onto you. I was devastated, and falling deeply and quickly into a very real depression. I finally left my room when I could muster enough strength and composure and went for a walk through the wooded area where I lived. I walked, and walked, and walked. Hours passed, the sun set, and I kept walking. I tried so hard to sort myself out but couldn’t, I just couldn’t find any place to focus inside of my mind. I walked with a heavy pace, trudging along until I had repeated the path at least 10 times. I made it back home and collapsed in my bed, able to sleep only due to the physical exhaustion I’d put myself through.
He looked up to see her gazing out towards the now pitch black sea. Come to think of it, he said, I don’t recall us ever really resolving any of the issues that came up. I remember the long road I took towards recovery, how I spent so long trying to get over you…
The burning candles that had kept the room lit started going out one by one around them. Without even a breeze to speak of, one after the other the light from each candle faded into black, all but the one that sat between them. The entire room had become nothing but a darkened void, leaving them alone at their table with only the noise of the sea and their lone flame to keep them company. She had returned her eyes to his, and her stare revealed a certain sureness of self about her, as if she had known all that was happening without any inclination that it might be strange for the restaurant to suddenly disappear around them like that.
He was also unable to acknowledge this sudden change in setting. He became transfixed on her silence for a moment, realizing suddenly that she had not spoken a word since they’d entered the restaurant. In fact, she had not spoken a word at all from the moment they began their day. Or had she? Trying to recall what they had done that day he suddenly realized that nothing was coming to mind, he was drawing blanks. He had remembered feeling quite exhausted from activities they’d partaken in while walking the boardwalk, but what did they do? The sudden realization of the impossibility of the moment faded when, driven by a sudden impulse, he asked her why she wasn’t speaking.
Body responded casually, but her voice sounded distant and was largely inaudible, resembling the sound of a static filled radio signal that caught the semblance of a human voice but nothing more. He stared at her as she was unable to respond to his question directly, she was unable to speak. He reached out to take her hand and held it tightly, Thank god you’re real, thank god. You are here, we’re here together… all those memories, all of it was not just for nothing, the love we built together, the future we’d planned, they are still here, now. I got scared, I don’t want to lose you, I can’t lose you, not again, I can’t go through that again. Please, I know you can’t speak, but tell me you’re real.
Sweat dripped down his brow and into his eyes as he felt his body heating up. He felt a lack of control over his surroundings creeping into him, the light on the table began to flicker violently over their faces. She remained still, now looking down into her lap. The sadness that clearly spread throughout every limb of her body crossed the table and entered him through his eyes, into his chest, and outwards towards his fingers and toes. His entire being became caught in a moment of utter despair, throwing him inward.
The memories that had not so long ago left him feeling good were now twisting and contorting into new feelings that clutched at his insides, causing him to lean forward in his seat. The sweat was now pouring down his face as he recalled what it had been like to have love turn against him, to have the future come apart through the forces of fate, right before his eyes. Promises that once held the pillars to his envisioned kingdom came crashing down all around him as the sea next to him retained its calm. The central promise, the strongest pillar that they had shared, the promise to get engaged, to be together forever, crumbled under the gravity of realization, of reality itself.
At that moment she turned her body sideways towards the sea. He begged her to speak, he begged her to hold his hand as he hung to his chest fending off impending madness. She ignored him, she paid no attention, seeming intrigued by something out in the ocean, far away. A light, floating in the distance just above the horizon. Why, why aren’t you answering me, god damn it why can’t you acknowledge me? he pleaded. He tried to get up, but couldn’t, he didn’t have the strength, the weight of too many broken promises held him firmly in his chair. Her hand, still in his, began losing its feeling. At first it became softer, as if melting, but then evaporated into a ghostly nothingness, just an image floating before him. He grasped desperately at her as she looked on into the distance, no nooo don’t go, please… I don’t want to be alone… and with that, he was.
The world whirled around him, months and months worth of ignored letters and phone calls, never a response, never a word in return. The feeling of loss overwhelmed him as he stared at the fading light of the candle that sat between them.
He walked out of the restaurant and onto the boardwalk. As he strolled alone down the road his dizzied mind tried to look at the faces that walked around him but they were nothing but specters, faceless shadows occupying the space in his mind. Even the street vendors that had just now offered an assortment of Sphinxes and Pyramids for sale were replaced with items that reminded him of his past with the woman he’d just watched vanish from his life. A small Ganesha statue that she had once loved, the bracelets she wore everywhere whose jingling noise would always give her away when she’d run up behind him to put her hands over his eyes, and even her toothbrush which she’d use to make him laugh with her ludicrous way of brushing her teeth. The dug into him as he forced himself to move on, to keep walking. But the items were quickly replaced by music they had once both loved and shared, by pictures they had taken together appearing in beautiful frames in the windows of stores, even the restaurants lining the sea had each become familiar ones they had once visited together. These all came together to create a force that knocked him to his knees as he pulled at his hair and screamed at the top of his lung.
Is this it? Have I completely lost it? I’ve had enough, I’ve had enough of this… I just can’t do it anymore, please release me from this mess, let me be me again. Let this be a dream, please let me just wake up… I just want to wake up from this past, I want to be left alone, if I can’t have you I just want to be alone… wake up.
I guess I made a mistake. In the long run I’ll be able to chock it up to basic instinct, but for now it still resonates as a self-defining moment of personal growth: don’t commit to anyone but yourself.
Of course that sounds rather dramatic upon first glance. Why not commit to anyone, you or anyone else would be quick to respond. Isn’t commitment to other human beings the basis for trust, and, isn’t trust the most important aspect of meaningful human relations? Yes, absolutely, of that there is little doubt.
I suppose my point is a bit more specific though… and that’s the problem when you make grandiose statements about, well, anything. You tend to forget that others don’t see the main point, if indeed you have one. The main point, mostly, revolves around a personal experience, and without being as specific as you could with a personalized blog entry then…. well you see where I’m going with this.
Which brings me to my main point. To be dangerously in love is to give yourself to fate, or, put otherwise, to submit yourself to a vision of the future where you and another person commit to a life that has yet to manifest itself into a tangible experience.
Danger and Love, here are two words that seem to be completely inseparable from one another. What is love without the risk of loss? Is it just being with another? I have heard a lot of stories from successfully married individuals who have said to me that love isn’t the overwhelming presence of love, but of its subtle yet known undercurrent. Love comes from the desire to see your other become better, and grow, rather than have them make you more of who you want to be. Two people who love each other therefore want the best for each other, because they know that when the other is at their best and is happiest, so will they be happiest so long as they have the space to grow as well.
To be as direct as possible, I think that to be dangerously in love means to be overexposed to a relationship which forces you to give too much of yourself to another, without being given (or taking the space) to grow yourself. I myself have been stifled by relationships, where I’ve found myself losing a connection with the aspects of life that make me happy and satisfied, compared to the needs of my other to whom I’d committed myself. I see now that this is a fundamental mistake… you must never love another to forget yourself. You love them because they bring something to you in your life, yes, but more importantly because they remind you of your own value and self-worth. I’ve found myself being neglected in the past, not only by my other, but consequently by myself as well… this is incredibly dangerous, because effectively your own measure for your confidence is based on someone outside of you. This is suicide, as you eventually lose the ability to gauge the value of your own beliefs and principles.
One thing that I’ve learned is that even unconditional love is conditional upon a few basic elements. I’ve loved unconditionally, that is, until I’ve realized that I was not given the same treatment in return. I don’t agree that a person should pursue someone they are infatuated with until they’ve convinced the other of their supposed love for them. I think that love should be mutually based upon respect and a sincere desire to watch one another grow together form each other’s presence. This may be idealistic, but I don’t care about that… all I know is that I know what I’ve missed out on, and I know what I want. I think that’s the importance of learning from failed love… you tend to narrow down more exactly what you expect out of a real long-term life partner, and what you don’t.
I know what I don’t want, and that is to be dangerously in love. That’s not to say I want a sterile and boringly secure relationship, without the excitement or passion that comes from the unknown. what I am trying to convey is that, come the future, I want to be more sure before trusting someone’s word before giving them more than they are ready to return.
He looked back at his life, and with great pains he decided that it was time to cut it up. Walking through his mind was like walking through a garden long unattended to. Whatever mental sanctuary that he once allowed himself to retreat from the world into had turned into a vine-filled labyrinth, hiding away the secret place that once gave him peace. Now, standing before this entangled garden with a machete, he knew he’d have to rent deeply into roots of the memories he once held dear, in order to liberate himself, and to clean up his mind.
It began slowly at first. Each time he would lift his arm up to swing, he’d be faced with too many questions. How can I release myself of something so dear… these flowers grew because of us, they are ours, do I have the right to release myself from them? And he’d put the small knife down and sit for a while in that mess of a place. He had tried hard to simply pull out the roots of these once beautifully flowered memories, but his hands, they would bleed from the protective thorns around the base of each thought. These thoughts, they made him who he was, and he’d loved who he was before they started withering away. Failing at pulling them out, he’d try desperately clean up bunches of vines with his hands, pushing over one rooted feeling over another, combining emotions into more painful wholes that would sting him from all sides. Eventually, he’d just sit back down and look on depressed at his state, and at his inability to separate himself from his past.
On the outside, the world continued along. Trapped within the labyrinth, he looked on outward, wanting, wishing that he could find the exit, that this place that once gave him a quiet place to think would release him once again into the world. To freely enter his mind without being trapped by his own thoughts, that’s what he wanted the most.
One day, while sitting, playing through his tangled mess of a mind, he did something he hadn’t tried for some time. He stopped, and closed his eyes. As he did so, the brownish coloured wall of vines disappeared before his eyes, a quiet came over him as he found himself alone for a moment. In that moment, he saw himself standing in a dark room. Next to him appeared a silent shadow, nothing more than a reflection of whatever he thought, as a chameleon that could shape-shift into whatever came to mind.
The shadow looked at him, and, shaping to a mirror image of himself, said, welcome.
I know I’m still in my mind, he instinctively responded, I know I’m still inside… but how did I manage to escape the garden? All I did was close my eyes. I’ve been trying forever to get out…
The black room that they both stood in suddenly changed in all directions,revealing a sky so blue that it at first blinded him. But of course it could not blind him, for he was in his mind’s eye, where the expected physiological effects of the world could not reach him. The entire room had become an open sky, and he stood in plain air above and below the clouds and nothingness.
Whoa.
You know you are in your mind, but what you may not have realized is that you yourself are but a part of your mind. Even you are not eternal, changing as would a rock at the bottom of a powerful stream. As the raging water increases in strength and rapidity, so do you change with it.
The thought lasted forever in his mind, ‘Am I real? What makes me, me?Am I just a passing figure in my mind?’
The shadow watched from its flatness on the ground, suddenly shifting into the shape of a specter of colours, like shifting blotches. His human characteristics remained as the colour patterns slid over one another. I want to show you something, it said.
Suddenly the world changed again, and the open sky grew giant grey walls all around it, closing off into a lare auditorium with thousands of paintings hanging from its enormous walls. Lit by a dim and sourceless warmth, it was as silent as it was enormous, less like a museum than a very nice storage facility.
The coloured shadow knowingly observed the momentary amazement spread across his face, for this was the first time that he was actually becoming aware of the greater truths about himself. The shadow knew that this would be an essential moment, one of great pain and of powerful realization for him. You see these paintings? it asked.
Indeed he did see them, looking up at the seemingly endless array of pictures, he was stunned. Yes… they are moving… he whispered.
What do you see in the paintings, the shadow pressed on.
I see… I see me, in all of them.
The shadow pointed to one picture in particular, tell me about this one, it said quietly.
That’s me… when I was 3 years old. I’m in my bed and crying for my parents… I just woke up from a bad dream, actually I remember it was a dream I used to have regularly when I was really young. The dream involved some sort of evil figure, usually dressed in some futuristic armor of sorts, and he would always be attempting to take my parents away. He’d try to kidnap my parents, leaving me all alone. I was so afraid of being alone, and I didn’t want to lose my parents to anything. Haha, at one point, I actually remember fighting back against the monster who tried to take my parents, and I would use kids toys, like a little plastic bow and arrow… but no matter, it worked! I chased him away, and I stopped having those dreams…
He paused, thinking back to the memory he had just described. ‘That was me…’ he thought.
The shadow said nothing, came up to him, put his arm on his shoulder and pointed to another.
That’s me again, wow, I remember this so well… I was on the bus, on my way home from school. I was maybe 12 years old or so. The kids on the bus, they were making fun of a girl behind me. They made fun of her because she worked for the local nigger. My dad. They spoke loud enough for me to hear, and they were ruthless about it. I remember I cried to my mom that night about it, I just couldn’t understand why they would do or say these things so often. I grew harder as a person because of them, and came to resent that small town and its people for many, many years.But that’s not me, now I would have gotten up and beaten those little fuckers. I wouldn’t take that shit, no matter their numbers. But I was young, and alone then…
He looked over at the shadow, and feeling upset by the resurge of these old memories and thoughts asked, I don’t understand what you are trying to do to me… how is this supposed to help?
The color shifting shadow looked away suddenly, and stared off into the distance, not responding to the question.
Great. My subconscious self is a snob, he thought as he looked around at the thousands upon thousands of memories of his past self that he had. He walked over to one picture up on the wall, and saw himself at the age of 16, in a Japanese highschool uniform. That was the first time he had been aware of himself as a thinking individual, it had been an eye opening experience to live abroad for a year at such a young age. It made him feel proud to know what he had accomplished during that year, and felt the presence of those experience still holding firmly to his character. It felt good.
Another picture upon the wall was a scene depicting him with some of his friends in Ottawa. University buddies that he had come to love… they represented a long period of his life, as a major part of what made him happy. He breathed in deeply, remembering the amazing times they’d had together during those important years.
He looked back at the shadow who stood, transfixed. His gaze hadn’t moved even slightly away from that one spot. He walked up next to the shadow’s flattened cast, reconnected his feet to its, and followed his stare to the picture on the wall.
What is that one? The shadow asked, breaking his silence.
That’s nothing, that’s just me now, standing in my garden. As soon as I open my eyes, I’ll just go back to being that again. I mean, look at this room, I know what this is, this is my memory bank of people I once was and have ceased to be. It’s a graveyard of regrets and friends lost, of the person I regret having been and regret not being anymore. I’m nothing compared to them, I’m nothing now… just someone trapped in his mind and unable to release himself from his own misery. Trapped by the memories of a failed love, and held back by too many other failures that came all at once. It’s just, me.
The shadow took on a new shape at the mention of the last word. It was still of himself but looking… better. Looking like a new man, one who had shed the skin of the past and was ready to live for the present. He looked rested, fed, and healthy. He looked like the man that he himself wanted to be. The shadow pointed to the picture next to the one of the present self.
That one is just… blank. Of course.
Those two last words caused the entire scene to change once again, blasting the walls of his mind outward, disappearing into the distance of a newly formed field. Feeling the sand suddenly form into millions of tiny spots below his feet, he looked up from the ground to see his entangled garden before him. A million thoughts rushed through his mind, but the last words, of course, pounded the loudest inside of him and sent out visible vibrations that blazed through the foliage.
He began to walk, hesitantly, and as he did so spoke quietly to himself. It is blank, the canvas is blank. I’ve been a lot of people in my life, and yet I remain. But what makes me who I am is malleable, always changing and never static. I can’t keep holding on to this dying garden because there are other flowers that want to grow beneath it. This is not who I am, because I cannot be defined by any one memory. I am the rock in the river, forever being shaped by an ever moving stream.Nothing is static, nothing will forever be the same except for time and change.
With each of these thoughts the weeds and vines withdrew slowly and quietly into the ground from which they sprung. The machete lay in the place he had just stood a moment before, unused and useless. He walked towards the walls that once stood tall and impenetrable, passing right through them without being cut or restrained. He watched how the feelings of love which had turned against him, stopping him in his path whenever he’d try to move on, fade into simple memories, free from the emotional ropes that had held firmly to his joints. The images that had been once joyful, turning unbearably sad with time, began to lose their hold on him and he felt himself liberated, slowly.
As the vines withered before his eyes, his spirit lifted slowly from the lump of coal it had quietly become, and he began to run. He ran towards an ever-opening field of colour, with a deep blue sky that brought it all to life. Memories flew by him in all directions, they no longer stopped him from moving in whatever direction he pleased. He felt alive again, he smiled and began laughing madly as he chased nothing around in circles in his mind.
After some time he stopped dead in his tracks. He bent over as quickly as he could and pushed aside some uprooted memories that lay scattered before him. There it was, staring up at him, like a welcomed little ray of hope. The sun shone brightly on his face as he reached town to touch the small sprouting plant before him. It had yet to bloom, but it was there… new life, a new memory to attend to. A new him.
He stood up, looked around at the field before him, a field of possibility. And, without even thinking, he opened his eyes.
I had a 24 hour bus ride from Luxor to Dahab… literally, 24 hours spread across two buses. To say the least, I had time to think.
What does one think of exactly when trying to pass the time over a long spread of road? Well, in my case I tried as hard as I could to sort myself out – I wanted to allow the Egyptian scenery to overlay a focused effort on figuring out what I have become. In order to do this successfully I figured I’d begin where I myself begin: from the stuff of memories.
Why do I have reserves of anger and animosity built up inside of me? Where do the bad vibrations come from? Why do I have nightmares that haunt my nights and leave me struggling to forget each morning? What are the roots of these feelings and negative thoughts?
Logically, human beings seem to be made up predominantly of memories. Who we are is a shape moulded by the experiences brought upon by time itself and our interactions within its continuum. Our memories make up the fabric of our being by providing the basis from which we draw our actions and thoughts. You wouldn’t know what a slap on the face felt like until you’d experienced one, and you’ll be sure to avoid another once you have. Add up all the metaphorical slaps to your face since the day you were born and there you have you. Naturally we’re more than simply our memories, we are also spontaneous creatures with the ability to decide on a whim what path we choose, but ultimately our memories make up the well of knowledge from which we draw when it comes time to decide, and in a way, our decisions turn actions define us.
My memories had left me feeling like I was the universe’s punching bag, and that pissed me off. To put it simply. When sorting out these memories, I had to figure out a way in which to turn them around, to make them not a source of animosity but rather a source of inspiration, or a positive force altogether. I began by looking at my biggest problem: emotion.
Recent memories have a way of confusing us with detail… have you ever noticed this? Have you ever experienced something incredibly traumatic and difficult, and then have been at a lack of words when it came to describing it? You just can’t, because when you do you get lost in a sea of details, where each memory contrasts over another, until your story turns into 5 or 6 stories… This is why time and memory are inseparable from one another, because the former allows us a certain freedom from the latter. To give myself to time, and to cut myself from those memories which invoke that… feeling inside of me, that feeling that tares away at my flesh whenever those thoughts come up… that’s what I will do. That’s what I have done.
The open road has been quite fabulous… it has given me the opportunity to sort myself out, and to cut out the elements from my life which I have deemed as negating the growth I now need to give myself to. I am going to give myself to life once again, and not expect anything in return other than the chance to act within time and space in the manner I see fit. I want to take some time each day to appreciate the open air, and to show my respect for the universe.
If I could give one piece of advice it’s this: love not another out of a lack for yourself, but to remember yourself.
The mental preparation is half the battle of any trips’ planning. I’d been so mentally ready 2 weeks ago when I was just about to finish up the last exam, then the sudden news of the operations that I’d have to undergo kind of cut my focus away from Egypt and to more pressing matters that lay at hand. Unfortunately, I’ve kind of found myself exhausted by the entire procedure, well, both of them, and now I’m feeling like 5 days of recovery is hardly enough to take on a full international backpacking trip after such intense operations on my body.
It’s the mind that’s tiring me out though. I guess the weight of what I’ve bore over the past while has finally begun to weaken my knees, and I’m not so capable of lifting free weights anymore. I’m thinking about what I have planned for the trip, and instead of generating excitement I’m sort of confounded by a sense of slight anxiety at the energy it will all take to perform. A desert Jeep Trek, a bus journey through 3-4 desert oases, exploration of Luxor’s numerous temples, a journey across the Red Sea towards Sharm el Sheik, a moutain trek up the Sinai range, and a trip to Petra in Jordan. After everything, will I manage to accomplish all of these goals? It’s okay if I don’t, but I’m feeling somewhat resentful at the unpredictable events that have taken so much of my spirit over the past couple of weeks. Normally the excitement of such a journey would be enough to psyche me up… I guess I’ll just have to wait until I’m in the plane and flying towards Cairo to have my energy fueled by the realization that I’m going to be able to walk inside of the goddam Pyramids of Giza. There, that helped boost me a little.
What do you see?
I never knew surgeries could take so much out of a person, and I had assumed more of myself than I thought I could deliver. I haven’t failed yet in achieving my set-out goals of my trip, but I feel as though they are a greater challenge now that I’m tired out than they were before. I’m trying to be positive about it all though, mostly by focusing on the elements that are good in life: I have my health back (more or less, still need to put on some weight), my brother’s coming with me on the trip, I still have my family and friends who love me and who have been there to support me throughout this mess. And I get to go to freakin’ Egypt. It’ll be good for me, the challenges will help push me further, in both my body and mind. Maybe this is what I need, another challenge after the barrage of attacks on my body mind and heart. A new, constructive challenge, where the rewards are self-satisfaction and knowledge that I can do more than I ever thought possible from myself. I might not be the tallest and strongest guy, but I’ll be damned if I can’t hold my own in proving my determination.
I have no expectations though. That’s the key element that I’ve learned to not being let down by life: don’t carry expectations from anyone or anything, lest you be willing to suffer the crushing reality that is yet to come. People will let you down, even the ones you least expect to. It’s not their faults, they are human. And situations do not carry any inherent promise of joy or value, it’s what you chose to take away from any event that will be its own value to you. Egypt was at one point my way out, a kind of way for me to allow hope to re-enter my life and to divert my attention away from the disappointment brought on by one person in particular. Now, it’s just another destination, another pin on the map… once I’m back, then it will have become something – whatever it may be, so be it.
I drew this in my old journal a few years ago. I was still hopeful about love back then, let's hope that comes back to me someday soon.
Maybe this is why I’m tired and not so excited anymore. This is scary, isn’t it? To not feel excited for life because life has taught me that being excited only makes for disappointment. I hope I’m wrong about this, and that I’m taught some magnificent lesson somewhere along the line by an incredible human being. Let’s just say that I’ll leave myself open to be easily manipulated by anyone who presents a better alternative.
There is something relevant about this life. I haven’t figure it out yet, and I don’t suppose I ever will. But I have a particular inclination, call it a haunting suspicion, that even though our days are filled with challenges and glimmers of understand of the lessons learned from them, we are indeed doing something with a purpose.
I used to write about the existentialists a lot. Basically, after having given up on the idea of committing myself to any religion, I sought a novel way of guiding my life. It became a slow and quiet hunt of sorts, where I’d read for hours on end about how others have gone through the same, and what conclusions they drew. The existentialists offered an interesting way out, one which involved a lot less introspection and a lot more action. They suggest a freedom to act and apply one’s will in this world, in order to make one’s way, rather than accept a greater force to guide us. I wholly accepted this way of thinking, it’s allure was too strong for me: I could make my own world how I saw fit, and my actions would be my own as I paved my way in life. Of course the forces of the world would act against me at times, but that’s essentially what life came down to anyway – will versus will. The key was to live a good life, one based on moral decisions that I felt right, not on ones dictated to me.
This worked fine for years, I realized the strengths of thinking outside of the coloring book lines. However, something new occurred to me over the past 4 months, something that I had perhaps missed when reading Sartre, Camus, Nietzsche, Kierkergaard, and Shopenhauer. They must have spoken of it at some point, Nietzsche must have at least. Fear and Pain are two aspects of reality that cannot be avoided, and yet, with the concept of living a life of self-creation, we tend to find other ways of maintaing any sort of hope for ourselves. When we seek out a life of meaning, creating meaning involves more than living by a certain set of principles, it requires something real, having a faith in more than just gods, but in humanity itself. It requires having faith in the goodness and sincerity of others… it demands more than just knowledge that we will be rewarded for good behaviour, and that sinners will be punished. It requires more than saying ‘god loves me, and that’s all I need in this world’. For years I managed to uphold my own belief by believing in my friends, in my family, and in the good of others. But I never tested this theory beyond my comfort zone, I had always just assumed that good people and things would come to me if I was good to the world.
I think fear and pain are two aspects of life that are inseparable from one another. As obvious as this may be, it has some serious repercussions on how we chose to live life itself. Fear is the natural instinct that allows us to avoid pain. It is the voice in our head that causes us to submit when faced with danger, and more specifically, with pain. Pain can come in any form at any time, but we can predict what kinds of behaviour or choices will lead us towards certain pain. Therefore, we limit ourselves to what’s possible out of the fear of pain.
This creates a natural threshold for us, not just one of preventing pain itself, but of what becomes the kind of reality we live in. Let me put it this way: if most people are too afraid to start a new venture, be it a business idea, asking out someone they have a crush on, or living up to the ideas they’ve talked about accomplishing, how will they ever know themselves? Fear and pain come naturally to many religions in the world, in fact some might argue that the very premise of religion is based on this. They account for it by providing justifications, offering promises for reward at the end of life, and that as long as they stay true to god or gods, their sacrifices and sufferings will not go unnoticed. But what about the agnostic, the atheist, or the existentialist? Not that these three in particular have anything in common, or are one in the same, but they all suffer from doubt, or at least from a certain self-awareness that pervades over their decision making centers. They chose to believe in the creation of their own lives, but how can they account for the suffering they experience, or for the pain that comes to them? What about the pain of death of close ones, or of the fear of being crushed by the world. Of losing faith in what gives them hope, such as in politicians, or in people, their very friends and support structures? Politicians are fickle, people change, support structures give and and at least once in our lives, we all fall to the depths of being and are forced to re-evaluate what we thought was reality.
What happens then, when, someone who believed that they controlled at leas their own perspective on reality and who made they own decisions realizes that what made them optimistic is but their own self-created veil, and that the world will do what it wants, when it wants?
Again, fear and pain are one in the same. However, the wise choice to make for any human being, is to not avoid either of them for fear of having their worlds crushed. Any world worth living in is worth rebuilding, that includes our very own understandings of the worlds we make for ourselves, each and every one of us. If some people want to recreate that world with religion, so be it, as long as they don’t force it on others. And if those others want to create it for themselves, the same must apply. But my point is this: it was only when I was crushed did I realize the potential in life, it was only then did I see just how amazing of an opportunity the loss of a set path can be. When you realize that plans and hopes don’t work out, when your house of cards comes tumbling all around you, the effect, religious or not, is devastating. But the reward comes not from the promises of recognition in the afterlife, but from the lessons we learn and get to teach to our children about the value of taking risks, of pushing our boundaries, and for realizing that pain and fear exist to teach us not how to self-preserve, but how to step outside of ourselves and realize our potential.
If something scares you, whatever it may be, face it. If you are hurt, don’t shy away, feel the pain and experience it. You’ll see just how tough you really are. And once you’ve done that, once you’ve managed to get beyond that crippling anxiety that once kept you from stepping any further, you’ll see yourself as a whole new person, fully capable of handling the world in a new and incredibly exciting way. Possibilities open up where before there were only closed doors, and all you needed to do was to take the risk.
My insides still hurt pretty badly from the operation. My heart is still numb from the recent loss its suffered. And my hopes in humanity have been somewhat lowered since I realized the behaviour of other human beings during the election I participated in. These have accumulated into a form of leveling explosion inside of me, taking what I thought I knew to be real and crushing it under the universe’s harsh steel-toe boot. But, no matter my world be shattered, I still remain to put together the pieces into a world worth living for. What the existentialists forgot to mention, or perhaps what I had accidently missed while reading them, is that hesitation in belief must always be tempered with a glimmer of hope – no matter how dark the days may get. Otherwise, you’re just giving in the light that feeds the very will you claim to be your guiding source in life. One cannot limit the belief in faith, but has to control and understand it before properly using it to create a better world.
I’m going to travel through Egypt for the next 26 days after 2 surgeries this past week, and regardless of the pain I still feel not only from that but from everything, I’m going to go further beyond what I thought I could once do, and I’ll be damned if I let a few bruises hold me down. Life is for the living, and my pulse indicates that I’m far from dead.
I leave you this song to contemplate your own life to. Until next we meet.
Live, Love, Travel. That is my ethos... I'm passionate about discovering new and exciting things, about doing what people tell me I cannot, and for meeting new and interesting people.
unintentionallyHuman 