The #1 Reason Getting A Personal Blog Noticed Is So Hard…

One word: trolls

I speak from only a little experience here. I have been blogging for years. First on Fictionpress, then on Myspace, later on Blogger, and recently on WordPress.

The fact is that when you submit a blog to any open source site (like Reddit, for example) you start out with +1. This means that if the first person who comes along to read your submission, doesn’t like it, and they down-vote it, you may as well resubmit some time later and hope that a few people will actually read the blog and either upvote, or leave it alone.

Correct me if I’m wrong here, but my understanding of the up-vote/down-vote system is that if you like something, you up-vote, and if you do not, you leave it alone. As far as I have understood, the down-vote is specifically there for unrelated content (links in the wrong subreddit) or inappropriate content (rickrolls, or something that is clearly an advertisement). Maybe I’m wrong about that.

Anyone who has ever submitted content to a open-source type site, knows that its entirely hit-or-miss. You may see a spike in your views, which you are greatful for, but, mostly, you just hope that you get upvoted more than you get downvoted. Unfortunately, unless you’ve established yourself as an official blogger, and have a large following, you aren’t likely to get far.

So this blog is to all the other bloggers out there. Keep trying, the more we submit, the more we are likely to get people to enjoy our work.

And the following is to the trolls: Please stop downvoting things you just don’t like. Case and point: I submitted a link to the Philosophy Sub-Reddit and it had 11 Up-votes very quickly. I was elated. Suddenly, the Troll-Patrol must have finally made their way to the Philosophy Reddit, because one terrific individual posted “wow, this is shit.” and clearly downvoted me. At first i read that as “wow, this is the shit.” only to continue reading his incomprehensible rant and realize that wasn’t the case. I replied to his comment as nicely as I could, asking him to explain his reasoning further, but it was too late, the Troll Patrol had already struck and I was downvoted to the bottom of the page. And one terrific individual even commented simply “Lack of analytic rigor: downvote.”

The life-expectancy of a submitted link to a personal blog is probably anywhere from 5 minutes to 1 hour. Thankfully my submission lasted almost 2 before it was overrun.

In conclusion of this blog (I fully expect this to be instantly downvoted and nobody will see it) I would like to place myself in the shoes of a troll for a moment….

UPVOTE IF YOU HAVE A PERSONAL BLOG AND HATE DOWN-VOTER TROLLS!!!

… thanks for your time.

A Soul’s Twin

The following is a slightly fictionalized retelling of a specific point in my life. Contains some bad language, and a little teen-angsty, but that’s how I wanted to write it, to capture the time. Note: Its pretty long, so, I dont expect everyone to read the entire thing.

Chapter 1: Introductions

Unfortunately, I was never lucky enough to have learned anything easily. I learned from the world around me; my friends, my family, books, video games, TV and the internet raised me. I watched and learned from my friends and family and began to develop my own personal moral compass. It all went horribly wrong one day, however.

“Hey man, you want to come over tonight?” My friend Michael asked over the phone.
“Yeah, it’s cool, I don’t work tomorrow.” I responded

A couple hours later he came by my house to pick me up. He was quite excited because his girlfriend had spoken to him all day long, and they had caught up on things. She lived one town away, and so they rarely got to go anywhere together, but their relationship was more than a year old and going well.

My friend Michael and I were work buddies, and he had just moved into town a few months earlier. He used to live in the same town as his girlfriend, but now that he was farther away, most of the time he had an air of depression about him.

We drove down the road and he talked more and more about his girlfriend. I had been in quite a few relationships, but this guy seemed really stuck on this girl. “Must be quite a gal in the sack” I thought to myself. Almost as if he read my mind, he started to talk about his sex life with her. Nothing unusual for two guys to do, and I knew, just like every other guy’s story about their sex life, it was way exaggerated.

We got closer to his house and I pulled out my newly purchased copy of Constantine on DVD. I grabbed my clothes filled bag out of his backseat and exited the car. It was weird because, the only things he was saying was about how intimate and close they got, but nothing sexual. I figured he was just wasnt the kinda guy to kiss-and-tell.

We got in his house, and the whole place was to ourselves. I put in the DVD and we cranked up his sound system. A little way through the movie, we paused for a break to get some sodas and other junk food from his fridge. He started talking about his girlfriend again, and I casually tuned out his ramblings. It wasnt that I am not a good friend, I had just been hearing about it all day and was tired of it by then.

He started talking about how alike his girlfriend and I were, and how the three of us should hang out sometime. I agreed and continued watching the movie. Half way through the movie and his phone rang, and he turned down the sound so I could barely hear the movie. I began to try and lose myself in my thoughts but he was talking on his phone quite loudly.

My attention was grabbed when I heard my name mentioned. Now his conversation interested me. He was talking about me and saying he was going to give the phone to me. I was already putting on my goofy-friend persona, because thats what guys do when they are forced to talk to people they dont want to.

“Hello?” The voice on the phone said with a slight giggle
“Yeah? Whats up? Me and your boyfriend were just talking about how hot you are, and he was telling me all the juicy details of your sex life.”
A laugh, then “Okaaaaay..”

I bullshitted for a few moments and then passed the phone back to my friend. He played the movie and headed into his bedroom to talk to her some more. Now I felt isolated. Alone.

I tried to get into my movie, but I was no longer interested in it. Working in a movie theatre and seeing all the movies you want for free as many times as you can kinda puts a damper on the excitement of the DVD release. After the movie concluded, he left his room.

“Hey man, should I give her your number? I think you two would be great friends.”
I figured I had enough friends as it was, but I shrugged and nodded in agreement.

The rest of the night was pretty boring, we hung out and talked more guy-shit. Then we woke up the next morning, and he took me home. After most of the day playing video games, the phone rang. A strange phone number that I didnt recognize.

“Hello?”
“Hi, who is this?” I asked.
“It’s Carrie. Michael’s girlfriend. Is this Mike?”

Yeah, my friend and I had the same first name.

“Yeah, what’s up?”
“Oh, not much, how about you?”
I wanted to scold her for disturbing me in the middle of a marathon of video game playing. Instead I said “Just playing games.”

I didn’t talk a whole lot, because I was more focused on my game than the phone. But she began to tell me about how she was currently visting a local college for a few days, and all the things she did there. It interested me slightly, as not many people near where I lived went to college. So, I figured she had to be smart. Always a good thing in someone who is to get along with me.

A few days later, my nihilism towards her had subsided and we were talking on the phone nightly. She was very smart, and we were able to talk about anything and everything. Soon we had talked about our pasts and present lives. She was into the same things I was.

It turned out that she hadnt been popular in her younger years due to a birth defect that wasnt removed from her face until she was almost a teenager. By then, everyone in the small town had already made the friends they wanted to. She wasnt a nerd, or a geek, just an outcast, left alone. I had always bordered between mildly well known and geek my whole life. I didnt much care though.

We decided to make a meeting time for when she got back from her trip to the college. She was going to bring along a friend along that she had met at the college. The next day, I woke up, got dressed and showered, and headed out of the house and down the street. I walked everywhere I went, because very few of my friends had a car. So, I went to the designated spot and waited around.

She and her friend showed up after a half hour or so. Carrie wasn’t extremely hot or good looking, but she was far from ugly. Her face looked like a blank canvas with eyes. Plain, but unique in her plainness. I walked with her and her friend down the road to the local gas station. Her friend was of american indian descent, and she was overweight with glasses. Naturally, I never listened enough to remember her name and spent the rest of the day trying to hide that fact.

A few hours later, and I invited Carrie and her friend to my house. I had no idea what we were gonna do, and I was nervous my mom was going to come home and kill me for having two girls over. So, we headed upstairs and Carrie’s friend picked up my newly purchased guitar and started playing with it. Carrie and I layed on our stomachs on my bed, side by side, looking at the various posters in my room. Suddenly, I looked at her, and there was that ’spark’. That sudden connection you feel to someone only seconds before you are about to kiss them, yeah, that one.

Being a young, testosterone-filled male, I didn’t think about the fact that this girl was dating my friend, or that her friend was just a few feet away from us, and even though she lived a town away it was possible for it to get back to my town. Nope, I didnt think about any of that, and luckily, neither did Carrie.

Either her friend wasn’t paying attention or she didnt care to, Carrie and I kissed for a few minutes, before I realized the gravity of the situation. I don’t remember whether I asked her friend to chill out downstairs so we could make out more, or if that was where it ended for the day, but, either way, the day ended, and she and her friend went home.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuuuuuuuck!” I couldn’t believe what had happened. I couldnt tell whether I was shocked that she and I had such a connection, or shocked that it never should have happened and should never happen again. I paced around my house for at least a half hour. What the hell was I thinking??? Why did that happen???

Towards the end of the night, she called. I had been hoping the whole day that the damned phone would never ring again, and that I could forget about the whole thing. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get past the connection we had, and how much in common we had with each other.

At this point, I believe some backstory is required to proceed. First off, I want to say that I was socially retarded in my younger years. I thought it a cool and good thing to tell people that I had special powers and abilities to fly, read minds, and other such fantastical things. Since nobody could disprove it, most people were just agnostic about it, or thought I was nuts and never talked to me again. This time that didn’t happen.

I decided to tell her this lie that I had told so many times I almost believed it myself. She didn’t blow me off, or just leave it alone and not talk about it. She believed it. With her whole heart. I was incensed, like a cult leader with his first real follower. Usually, I told this story to help weed out people who werent open minded, so I figured that it was a fifty-fifty shot that she would freak out and never talk to me again, and therefore the whole thing would be over with. It went a whole new direction.

She was curious, like her eyes had been opened to a whole new world. We talked for hours and she asked questions and I gave her answers. Along with this lie, I always mentioned that there was a propehecized soul-mate for me and I would know it when I met them, and they would know it. I did not think of the rammifications of telling that portion to someone so willing and accepting to it. Maybe I had charisma, or maybe I was a good storyteller, or maybe she just trusted me enough not to lie to her, whatever the reason was, within a few days she was convinced that I had these abilities, and that she was possibly my soulmate. And within that same amount of time, I had clung to that lie because it helped to justify the fact that I had made out with one of my friend’s girlfriends.

Chapter 2: The Rollercoaster Begins

We thought we were in love. Yeah, that shit. We were batty for each other. But we got along so well. She lived so far away that we didnt often see each other often, but that seemed to reduce the amount of worries we had and drama in the small town. At least, it did for a time. She began to talk to me about my friend and talk about how much of a weird guy he was, and kind of a dick. I chose to believe it, because, even though it was none of my business, it helped to justify our weekly, clandestine rendezvous. A shock came a little while later when my friend let me in on the fact that, though he had been dating Carrie for some time, they had never slept together.

Almost every week she came over to my house and by the second time she was over we were sleeping with each other. A shock came a little while later when my friend let me in on the fact that, though he had been dating Carrie for some time, they had never slept together, and he was, in fact a virgin. That didnt make me feel very good for banging his long-time girlfriend before he did. She was lying to her mom to get her to my house, I was lying to my friend about why I couldnt hang out with him. It was a horrible situation to be in, and yet poetic, very Romeo and Juliette. Surrounded by opposition, we found each other.

Things had remained well under wraps, and no complications seemed to have come up, or would. When one of us got worried that what we were doing was wrong, the other would assure that what we had was real love, and it was destiny, and it was right, and we were just doing what we had to.

The local town fair was about to come around again that year, and I had gone the year before with my big brother. I decided that this would be the one place that Carrie and I could lose ourselves in the crowd, and not be noticed, and yet be out of the house, and in the town. The first complication arose when I spoke to Michael and found out that he was going to be going to the fair with his girlfriend. I hadnt heard Carrie mention this before, and she had already made plans with me days before to go with her. Trouble.

I really wanted to go, and so did Carrie, so we decided to just go about it in a sneaky way. She and I would go to the fair early, spend time together there, then, later in the afternoon and towards nighttime, we would both spend time with Michael and the friends he was bringing along. And then the next night, we would enjoy the nighttime events at the fair together that we had missed the previous night.

I had told Carrie that it was no longer cool with me that she was still dating my friend, and sleeping with me. It had just become too much. She told me that she would break up with him on the night of the fair, since that was when she would next see him.

She showed up at my house that morning. We had sex, and went to the fair. We went back to my house to have sex again around noon. I remember her drinking a huge glass of water very quickly. We laughed at each other. We were care-free for once, and it seemed like a good thing. I felt like it was the beginning of us really dating, a glimpse of the future. It was liberating, until, in the middle of having sex, Michael’s friend called Carrie. We had ditched him to go back to my place. Then, Michael started calling, and we were trying to ignore it and continue on. Finally, we were done and we started walking back to the fair, hand-in-hand, and suddenly from the bushes separating us and the street, Michael’s friends came out.

“Hey, we been looking for you two everywhere!” We let go of each other’s hand and distanced ourselves from each other casually. Nobody saw. Then, Michael came over. He had on the face he wore when he was in public, which can only be described as “i look badass, right?”. He took Carrie by the hand immediately and began to walk ahead. It was an absolutely shocking sight. I was not prepared for it, and had to remind myself that he was there first.

Jealousy. A feeling I had not experienced in a long time. I just kept back, and acted like I didn’t know Carrie that well, and felt comforted that by the end of the night she would be my girlfriend and all these problems would be done with.

We all rode some rides and I tried to hide my discomfort of the summer heat and the situation. When they kissed, I cringed, when he held her hand, I scowled, when they hugged, I looked away. I decided that I had to find my other friends and hang out with them. So, I did, and kept away from Michael and Carrie for a few hours.

Towards the end of the night, Carrie tracked me down, sitting on a bench alone. She apologized for the days events, and told me that tomorrow would be different, and that in just a few hours she was going to break it off with Michael.

So, I hung out with Michael, Carrie, and Michael’s friends, and suddenly Carrie and Michael had disappeared. Me and Michael’s friend decided that they had gone back to Michael’s car. We went there, and we could see the shadows of the two of them in the back seat of the car. The windows were fogged up. And I could see that Carrie had her head in Michael’s lap.

I was enfuriated. She was blowing him instead of breaking up with him! What the hell?! Fucking great. I couldnt take it and left. An hour or more later I came back to the car and they were still there. Another hour passed and I returned. They had gotten out, and Michael’s friend was telling them how we had thought they were having sex. They assured both of us that they were just talking. I had had enough of emotions and drama for the day. I said goodbye and started walking away. Carrie caught up with me and I asked her if she had been having sex with him. She told me they hadnt. So, I asked if she had broken up with him, and she said that she had, and that Michael thought it was just a ‘break’. It did help to make the day a little brighter.

The next day we spent the whole time at the fair again. We were just with each other, and didnt worry. Nothing mattered. We were kissing gently in the middle of the fair, when, I looked behind Carrie and saw Michael’s whole family. All of whom knew both me, and Carrie. I just hoped they hadnt seen us. They didnt mention anything weird when we spoke to them, and we went on our way. We went to eat some food at the McDonalds to get away from the fair. I was still shaking.

Carrie told me that it didnt matter because Michael and her werent currently dating, but i told her that it didnt matter much, because, Michael would find out that she and I were now dating. Not good either.

We went back to the fair, and we had a romantic time on the Ferris Wheel. Unlike all my other girlfriends, we didnt have to constantly hold hands, hug, or kiss. We just felt each other, and that was enough to satisfy. We saw the fireworks go off, and the night concluded perfectly. It was everything I had hoped for with her the night before.

Chapter 3: The Lies

And this is where the whole thing gets turned upside down. Carrie came over a week or so later, and she and I hadnt been spending much time on the phone anymore. It was weird, and I figured that she had just become disenchanted. This whole time I had a girl on the side I had been dating for some time off and on, but she and I rarely saw each other, and we hadnt had sex yet, so I didnt think much about the fact that I, too, was cheating on someone.

Carrie finally tells me, as we had spent the day together watching movies and sleeping together, that she had been spending all the last couple weeks with Michael. And that she had not really broken up with him. Greeeeeeeat.

My phone rings and it’s Michael.

“Listen Mike, I just called Carrie’s house, her mom told me she was over at your house. I’m on my way over, and I’ll be on your doorstep in less than a minute.”

We threw on our clothes, folded in the fold-out couch, and pretended like nothing was wrong. I told Carrie to answer my door. From upstairs I hear her scream, and I hear loud stomps up the stairs to my room. My room smelled like sex. Thank god he was a virgin and therefore unfamiliar with the scent. He was holding a BB pistol, and Carrie ran up the stair screaming “Dont hurt him!”

“What’s going on Mike? What’s my girlfriend doing over here?”

“We just been hanging out and watching movies. What’s up with the BB gun?”

“It’s yours, just wanted to return it.”

It was minutes before my mom was coming home. I had to get them out of there quickly. I made excuses that they had to leave, and it seemed that Michael was suspicious. My mom pulled into the driveway just as Carrie and Michael disappeared around the corner. Barely made it. Michael called me from inside his car. “Listen Mike, the three of us need to talk and get things straightened out. Somethings going on and I wanna find out what.”

I left my house, and joined them. We drove in silence to a nearby park. I was panicking. I didnt know what Michael did and didnt know. And I didnt wanna tell him something he didnt know already.

Standing in the park, Carrie and I lied. I told Michael the same story about my ‘abilities’ that I had told Carrie. I told him that, friend-wise, Carrie was my soul-mate, but not that we were in love, or anything else. And that was why we had been so secretive. He half bought it. He took me home.

Carrie called.

“Listen, I’m tired of this, I’m telling him everything. You and I arent meant to be together. I love him, and I see a future with him, not with you.”

Brutal. She gave me one more chance to prove that we were meant to be together. She had purchased a replica sword and told me to use my powers to take it, and give it back to her at a later date. Since I had no real powers, the sword went nowhere, which must have solidified to her that either I was lying, or that she didnt mean enough to me for me to prove I have abilities to her.

I told her that she was just running towards a fake ideal of a white picket fence. She was too head strong and strong willed to be a stay at home mom, and too adventerous to marry a guy who wasnt going to travel anywhere. I told her goodbye, and to enjoy her white picket fence, and hung up.

A few days later, I went outside to ride my bike to a friend’s house, and found a video game I had let Michael borrow, on top of my bicycle. A note inside the user booklet said “Today, 3:00pm, Be Here”. The shit must have hit the fan. And promptly at 3:00, Michael showed up. He told me to get into his car. I agreed, but I kept a hold of the knife in my pocket. He had some randomly violent tendencies, and I really didnt wanna get killed.

He told me that Carrie had informed him that she and I had been sleeping together for a long time, and that I had pretty much been trying to convince her to break up with Michael, and she didnt want to, but I wouldnt stop, or let her go, and I was obsessed with her. Terrific, she threw me under the bus to save her own ass, shoulda seen it coming.

I agreed to the truth of things, but I told him that it was her who was the agressor. I didnt tell him of how many times we had slept together, or anything. But by the end of the night, he seemed cool and we seemed able to stay friends.

Days later, my girlfriend called.

“What the hell, who is Carrie? I just got a call from Michael saying that you been banging his girlfriend.” Fuck… I’m the odd man out. Apparently it was too much for Michael to just let it go. He had to try and destroy the other relationship I had. I was good at denying things, and the whole thing blew over pretty quickly. Word spread through the town quickly, and I went suddenly from nerd/geek most of the town only knew of, to well known, and well hated, cheating guy/manwhore.

Chapter 4: The Separation and Reuniting

A few months later, I moved out to another state. My girlfriend and I had started getting kinda serious. By my current standards it wasnt at all serious, but at the time I believed it was. I was living out of state and checking my myspace one day, and Carrie had messaged me. She had said that her and Michael had split because he got freaky and abusive. She and I started talking on the phone again, our awesome long conversations.

It always amazed us how well we got along. And how well and easily we could just pick up where we had left off from our last talk, even though months had passed. I was moving back into town temporarily for a month or so to help my brother and I move to California. I was going to be living with my best friend in town as I was no longer in contact with my mother.

While I was gone from the town I was able to reevaluate the things I never got to do, and specifically the girls I was never able to sleep with. And since Carrie and I were back in touch, and she was away from Michael, it seemed appropriate that she and I would be able to spend lots of time together.

When I got into town, I spent the first week or so with my girlfriend practically living with me. Then Carrie said to me over the phone that she and I could hook up. I promptly made a fake excuse of needing a break to my girlfriend, and the next day Carrie was spending the night. It was something she and I had always wanted to do.

My best friend, whom I was living with, and his girlfriend kept commenting about how cute we were together. But, for me, something was missing. The sex wasnt as magical. I didnt have the feeling behind it that I once did when I said I loved her. After only a few days straight of her spending all her time with me, I could practically taste this void between us. She seemed to love me more than ever, more honest than ever, but I never felt farther from her.

We still had awesome conversations, and we still slept together, but it now seemed like the sex was just something to get out of the way. Something we just did, and then would continue talking. I felt closer to her as a person, but I suddenly realized that she was too insecure, and deceitful, and not traveled enough for me to be able to ever date again. I suddenly realized that what she and I were was an ideal that had shattered a half year earlier.

It soon turned out that she and Michael were living together, and that she had been sneaking over to my friend’s place. It was too much drama again. I thought she had grown up, moved on, but she hadnt. Maybe that was the distance I was feeling, I dont know. So I split things with her and mended things with my girlfriend. Carrie and I kept in touch on occassion while I was in California for the next few months. She sent me some letters, and they were nice to read.

After only a few months my brother and I moved back into town with my grandmother, until we could find an apartment. Carrie and I saw each other once, and I think we made out for a moment, but again, the spark was gone, it seemed a chore, or courtesy.

Just after my brother and I got our apartment, my old girlfriend and I split for good because she moved to California and left me for a black guy. It ended roughly. Carrie and I kept in touch more and more, and she decided to come over for guitar lessons from me. She was in a new relationship now, with some new guy. And I was dating an old friend from High School. Carrie and I reminisced about the old days, but I kept my distance from her, emotionally. I enjoyed our common interests, and the special feeling and connection we had, but it now had a title, a place, a name. I realized I loved her now, like a sister. Someone who had a lot to learn, and hurt me unintentionally, but still, hurt me. We were close in age, but in maturity, I was leaps and bounds ahead and because of that, she would never be on the same level as me.

I realized that we were twins. We werent ex’s. Our soul’s were identical, but everything else didnt match. She was a best friend, and would always be, just like any of my best friends I had kept in contact with.

My new girlfriend Kristen slept over one night. I tried to have sex with her, but she wasnt ready. After that she called less, until suddenly, every time we made plans to hang out, she was out snowboarding with a friend. She bought me some christmas presents. Said she loved me. One day she somehow found out that Carrie and I were talking, which she didnt like, because she and the rest of the town knew about our past. She was really just a fling, a way to get over my ex. Then suddenly I asked her who she had been spending all her time with. She had been spending all her time with Michael. They had been snowboarding together, and suddenly I realized what was happening.

Michael was pissed that ever since me and Carrie had our fling together, it ruined their future. So, he found out from friends of the town that Kristen and I were dating, and decided to steal her from me. Try and get revenge on me. Kristen was a virgin, and hadnt been ready. Kristen told me one day that she was leaving me for Michael. She said she could see a future with him, that he had direction. I told her to enjoy her white picket fence.

Months later she texted me thanking me for not taking her virginity, she wasnt ready, even when Michael took it. She thanked me for respecting her.

Carrie and I had more guitar lessons together, but things had changed, and we acknowledged that fact. I had found a new girlfriend and she and I were very serious, and I really did love her, and Carrie said she had found the same thing in someone too. It was always depressing when she came over, it was a haunting reminder of a shitty part of the past I had, and it seemed that Carrie was wanting, and aching for me to just tell her I loved her. She didnt say it or hint at it, but it seemed that in the negative spaces of what wasnt being said was her yearning for me to tell her to be with me. She was with a guy she liked, maybe even love, but the guy didnt like me, and didnt want her talking to me. And he had no direction for leaving the state, or getting a college education. He wanted her to be a stay at home mom.

Thats just not Carrie. Its not how she is, but she is torn. She loves him, and she holds me in a special place in her soul, as I do with her, but she has to choose between guys she loves, and being in touch with me. It must be tough for her. I feel bad, really.

Last time I saw her, she came into my work and told me she was engaged. She showed me the ring. All I could think of to say is “enjoy your white picket fence”. It sounds antagonizing, but its not. She has to either force herself to really want to be a dependent, stay at home mom, and just learn to live like that, or she has to learn that that isnt who she is or what she wants, and find a way to change things.

Anyway, that last time I saw her was probably close to a year ago give or take a few months. I miss our old talks, and it’s been too long that we have been in contact with each other. I hope she is okay, and happy. Even if she doesnt get back in touch with me because she loves some guy who doesnt want us talking, thats fine. I love her enough to let her create her own identity separate of me. I have certainly found my own identity, and figured out what kind of connection she and I have. She is my soul’s twin. But I found my soul’s mate. I hope she can do the same, and she and I can return to our great and long talks. I miss those talks and discussions terribly, and despite everything, I am not mad at her. In fact I understand her. We make mistakes. That was more than three years ago, the Fair. She and I were 17 years old. We are almost 21 now. I hope that we can get back in touch and never lose touch again.

She and I used to always say that we were the kind of people who could go months or even years without contact, and then get back in touch, and pick right back up where we left off. I am ready to pick back up with our friendship, and I hope she is too. If not, then I will wait patiently until the day she does.

Vertical Consciousness

The scariest thing about vertical growth of consciousness is a hands-off understanding and growth of it, at least directly hands-off. The thing that I myself have a hard time getting past is that through meditation and self understanding you will grow. You may never reach the ultimate constant witnessing of a peak experience, but you must enjoy the occassional samsara.

The hard thing to grasp is that growth of consciousness will come naturally, like a plant, given the right conditions. However you must make sure that you are at the most optimum condititions to recieve that seed’s growth. The soil, the basis for the seed’s life, must be nutrient rich. Keep learning and understanding to enrich your consciousness’ soil. The seed will need sunlight to be able to feed itself. Keep meditating to ensure that your consciousness can sustain itself without your direct interferance. Keeping all your conditions optimum means that eventually the seed will grow, your consciousness will expand and you will flex/flow. But, like the soil and the sun, it doesn’t wait for the seed. It doesnt need the seed to benefit all the other seeds and life.

That is the hard part, keeping yourself at optimum conditions and not yearning or waiting for the seed to arrive. I happen to be very goal-oriented, and when I want to accomplish something, I get it done. However, I’ve come to realize that this driving mechanism for my existence up until now, is tethering me to lower-consciousness. This striving for learning and understanding has gotten me this far, and I now realize that it too must be let go of.

I currently dangle over the cliff’s edge. I’m surrounded and can peer into the hyperspace of open consciousness. However i’m dangling off the cliff’s edge, tethered to it by the things i’ve used to get me to the cliff and finally to jump. The jump wasnt hard. I wanted it, and I wanted to understand it. I wanted to be immersed in it. That is the cord that keeps me attached to the cliff. I am so close to hyperspace, I can see it, but I’m not free of the cliff enough to explore and understand it.

That’s when it happened. My dreams seem, for me, to be the ultimate gateway into understanding. In a dream, you are aware of this new world, and you completely accept and understand it with no need to explore it as a new whole, because it is a part of you. The lucid dream, though paramount, is hard to achieve. You must break free of the blind acceptance of the dream, but you must do it gently as to not shock yourself awake. The integral balance lies within the lucid dream.

Understanding lucid dreams made me understand something else. If a dream is the usual, the normal, the accepted, and the lucid dream is seeing all and understanding all in the dream without exploring or needing to research, then so is the relation to everyday life and mass consciousness. Not many people lucid dream, and even fewer remember it if they do. There are many techniques to make yourself likely to attain such a dream, but there are no guarantees. You just have to do what you can and be prepared for the moment when it arrives.

I’ve realized that today. I need to learn and explore and grow within my world. However, there are so many books, and maps, and understandings of the world. There are even books and techniques to achieve the hyperspace of consciousness. But there are no books on what that consciousness is, or how to guarantee its attainment, or the personal changes you have to make or un-make to be apart of it. That’s because, “the limits of my language are the limits of my world”. We do not yet have enough understanding to put it into words, and there are so many unknown variables that a how-to guide can only be vague at best.

And it has suddenly ‘clicked’. I was trying to know and understand this hyperspace, and get there already. I made the jump but I was still attached to the cliff.

There is no jumping. You don’t jump off the cliff at all. You stand at its edge and step off the edge. Once off it’s edge you disintegrate as your former sense of one goes away and you become a part of that consciousness. You do not seek to understand it, because you are it.

With this new understanding I awoke this morning feeling euphoric and in a creative meditative state. Yesterday I was dangling from the cliff, attached by unknown and unseen cords and tethers. I now am floating off the cliff’s edge. Still attached to the cliff, but understanding that I am. Knowing that I am attached to it, but in knowing that, I am far better off than I was before. I am ensuring that my soil and sun are at the optimum conditions. I no longer need to dangle, by dangling, the tethers become my focus, another thing to understand and learn and try and sever, instead of allowing myself to just be.

The Future (2012)

The Shady figure in the trench coat stood reading his newspaper, right where he was told to be, he was even an hour early just to make sure that the transaction went through without a hitch. He was looking for just another face in the crowd, but this face would be one of many faces that would save the planet as we all know it. The man in the coat hiched up his high collar and adjusted himself where he stood, ready for a long, but worth while wait. It had been just another day when he got the anonymous call. He needed to know only where and when once they told him they pay off for this simple pick-up and delivery. He could retire immediately if he did just this one job. It was simple, wait by the bench on the east side of the airport, next to the keychain rack, with a three day old New York Times. Be there at ten, he had been told. He was looking for a girl who would be about five and a half feet tall, dark hair, scarf and a small roller suitcase. She would identify herself as Jade and ask if he was Thomas. He would acknowledge he was even though he had already been told that the real Thomas was already ‘taken care of’.

He would then walk her to the limo out front, and at some point or another, either coax her into giving him the ‘package’ or just take it by force. They told him that if he was lucky that the man he was impersonating may be the one who the package was to be delivered to. Well he didnt give a damn, he would get what he was sent to get, one way or another, he didnt care, too much money was at stake, and clearly this package was worth a whole lot. Well the man in the coat stood reading his old New York Times, the biggest highlight of that day being “Underground Anti-Government Apocalyptic Cult”. The man had read it several times and heard it on the news for months now. There was some group of freaks all over the world who thought that the world was going to end in the next year, 2012, and that the world would go into shambles. They were trying to get as many people as they could to ‘open their minds’ and ‘arm themselves with knowledge’ about how the world is going to end in the coming months. It was a bunch of crap, he knew, but it was sure getting a whole lot of people and attention lately. He figured they just drugged alot of people by sneaking into random water supplies.

Just as his legs were starting to cramp from having stood in place for so long, he got a break. A girl who fit the description walked just past him and glanced at him as she did. She seemed to want to find herself a keychain next to him. He adjusted his weight and waited for her to speak, when she didnt, he just assumed she was some other tourist and continued reading where he had been.

“You Thomas?” The girl spoke as she browsed through the keychains.
“Aida?” The man in the coat asked, lowering his paper. The girl nodded and had found a keychain of the statue of liberty which she smiled at and whispered “He’ll love this!”. She walked to the counter and purchased the item, walking away as if she didnt care one way or the other if he followed.
“The Limo’s out front ma’am”

“Thanks.” She responded quickly, looking all around her as if she were weary of being watched. Once they had made it across the crowded La Guardia Airport, he walked Aida to the Limousine, even opening the door for her, which was surprisingly the only time he had been nice to a mark, but what the hell, he was going to retire a rich man before the day was over, so whats a little courtesy at the last minute? The man in the coat climbed into the drivers seat and drove into the heavy traffic of taxis and bustling pedestrians. After he made it through he finally decided to get to business.

“Ma’am, now i’m just a lackey, so I dont know much, I just do what i’m told and am where I am supposed to be, when i’m supposed to be there. But, I have to ask, what’s all the secrecy for? What -exactly- am I working for?” the man asked glancing at the young woman in his rear-view mirror.

“Thomas, did you read that paper you were told to bring? Or did you just stand there trying not to stick out like a sore thumb?”

“I sure did read it, three days ago though when it first came out.”

“And that cover story, about the Apocalyptic Cult, what are your feelings on it?”

“Well ma’am I dont think much, I mean with all the people getting into it, there has to be something to it right?”

“Well, Thomas, what I have here is crucial to their cause, to our cause. Mine and yours. And everyone on this planet.”

“And what is it that can be so crucial to this? And shouldnt it be in a metal case with a handcuff attached to your wrist if its that important?”

“Of course it -should- be. But that just doesnt work without drawing suspicion. See Thomas I figure you should know what you are fighting for, what you are honestly risking your life for everytime we ask you a favor of us. See what I have here is the correspondences between the two generals of the cause, Thomas. We arent anti-government, we just know how they will act when this all goes to hell. And we arent an apocalyptic cult because we dont pray, we dont share a common God, or hold any sort of rituals at all, me merely see what is coming and do what we know we must to prepare for it. We have been preparing for years, you as well as everyone else only has been hearing about it because all we need now is people, numbers. Everything else is perfectly set up.”

“Hmmm, well I suppose its none of my business really. I shouldnt have asked, I was better off not knowing.” The man in the coat now wondered if it had been the government that sent him, then again if the government wanted this done, they would have their own guys do it, not some hired gun do a random pickup for them. No, he had been contacted, obviously, by the opposition to this cult, or whatever the hell it was. He didnt care, he only saw dollar signs as he looked at the girl in the backseat with her bag leaning onto her. When he was free of the traffic and he figured it was alright enough, he turned off the highway and down a path he knew well was usually deserted about three miles down it.

“Hey, we arent supposed to turn off until we hit Wantagh, where you going???” Aida asked, now slightly alarmed.
“They closed the offramp for Wantagh for construction, if you want to get there within the next hour you gotta turn off early.” The man replied. He had always been a quick thinker, maybe thats why he was so good.

“Oh. Alright.” She grabbed the bag and set it in her lap now, holding onto it like a little girl clutches a doll. The man in the dirvers seat now began to slow down and pulled over, the tinted windows and the mostly deserted road was all he needed. He turned around and leveled the silenced beretta at the young woman in the backseat.

“Well Aida, unfortunately I gotta cut your trip a little short.” The girl in the back seat looked out all the windows around her as if there was something that she might see that could help her. She reached for the door handle and the man in the coat quickly locked all the back doors.

“Well, I dont know who you are Sir, but i’m sorry you had to choose this route. The other side probably contacted you after they offed Thomas, huh? Probably offered you a huge sum of money, more money than most people see in a lifetime huh? Well did they tell you that you would never see this money? That you would spend the rest of your days in their service either by choice or by force? Or how about the fact that they will torture and murder anyone you know, or have ever known? Did you think of any of that before you accepted? Or how about this fact, shithead, that someone as important as I am carrying something as important as this would have a hell of a lot more protection and cover than just some random wheelman probably living out of some seedy motel in Queens?”
The man in the coat was tired of this, and just wanted to get this taken care of, so he pulled the trigger once he knew it was aimed for the center of her head. Just as he did and he saw the flash of the shot and heard the muffled sound of the bullet being projected out of the gun, he felt a sharp pain in his left shoulder. The girl sat, unmoved, and unharmed in her spot in the back of the vehicle. The man in the coat now felt hot metal searing into the muscle of his left shoulder. It seemed impossible! He had leveled the shot! She was dead! She had to be! And right as he was about to pull the trigger the little bit of the conscience he had left whispered to him “I wouldnt do that if I were you.”

Suddenly the conscience was now a loud and audible voice in his head. “The first time’s a warning, asshole. Next time you’re gone. Now you have two choices, drive the lady to her destination and we may help you to a hospital, or you can pull the trigger again and see what happens. The next shot -will- land somewhere in your brain, paralyzing you in extreme agony for hours until you finally die of exhaustion and blood loss. Your choice, buddy. Personally I would probably enjoy the option that doesnt include dying.”

The man in the coat was astounded, so many things were now becoming apparent to him. That there was both so much more to this world than he had ever imagined, that he was bleeding pretty badly and needed to get to a hospital in a half hour if he planned to save the nerves in his arm, and that the young woman in the backseat now pointed outside. The man looked out his window and saw a figure atop the hill across the street. It had been there for only a split second, but it was long enough to get the point across. He turned around and tossed the gun into the passenger seat next to him. He took off the hazard lights and pulled back onto the roadway.

“You know, if you want to live past today, you have only one option. If you go back having not collected what they sent you to, you are really gonna get it. And even if you went back with what they asked, they would still make you wish for death, they would say, because you were stupid enough to do anything for them. So, if you want help, if you have any loved ones, you must join us, because I promise they will hunt all of them down. And they will torture them for days, even weeks before they finally end their pain. You’re stuck in the middle of this. So you either help us fight for our cause, or you die. The choice is yours.”

The man in the coat listened to the girl’s words and rolled them over in his mind. Suddenly a random though popped into his head, and he figured he may as well ask, it didnt matter, if he knew too much, he would be killed anyway right?

“If I can ask… why are the two generals sending their information through some young lady like yourself? I mean we have email, fax machines, cell phones, the internet, tons of other, faster ways to keep in touch with people, why this way?”

“Well, because its all monitored by the government now, they are looking through every email, tapping every call, reading every fax or piece of mail. This is the only secure way to transmit the information. The two generals need to give status reports of numbers of recruits, numbers of losses, number of monetary profit and gain, etcetera. I make this trip almost weekly. I’m surprised it’s taken the opposition this long to figure out what was going on, though, you’re showing up this long after we started shows we are doing a good job.”

“I suppose you are right. But where do you fit in all of this? I mean you must be good at something that gave you this grea job of importance, right? So what did you do, or, more specifically, what is your significance?”

“Well,” She held up her left hand and it showed she had an wedding ring on it. “I would say I fit just nicely into the equation, being the western general’s wife.” The man in the coat considered his options and knew he had to join them, but he still couldnt help the feeling that the money he could make from this would make all this nonsense go away. “You and all the other useless rabble in the world, my friend.” the voice in his head spoke again, it was the same man’s voice, young, probably in his twenties.

After following the directions by the young woman in the back seat the man in the coat arrived at a total normal looking home in the middle of a road of normal looking homes in the middle of Long Island. The house was decently sized, looked fit for a normal sized family. The lady in the back seat exited the vehicle with her baggage, after the man in the coat unlocked the door. His vision had steadily been blurring since he had hit the turnpike and he felt more and more light headed as the minutes ticked by. The door next to him opened up. A man stood there and motioned for him to move over to the passenger’s seat, which he did as quickly as possible. The man adjusted the seat and drove off down the road.

“Well what’s your decision?” The new driver asked.

“I dont know, its alot to take in. This has to be something huge, there must be more to it. But I just cant grasp the fact that everything i’ve ever known or expected out of this life, the government, or the world is a lie.”

“I understand what you’re saying, i’ll take you to the hospital to think this all over.” the driver said. After a few minutes he slowed down and put the car in park, opening up his door and stepping out of the car. The door slammed and rang through the man in the coat’s head. He saw beyond the darkened windows two figures join the figure of the driver. He heard what he thought was one say “Up first? Ok.” And a moment later he felt as if he were suddenly on a roller coaster. The car had been sent soaring up into the air about twenty feet off the ground, at the apex of the blast, there was a small bright green light he saw out the side of his window that now pointed down at the figures below. Before he could react the light became huge in an instant. It crashed into the side of the car, the car went flying up and backwards into the trees, very quickly disintegrating as it did. Sparks and small specks of the car’s frame caught the sun just right and glittered as it fell towards the ground.

In the distance the young woman could hear the faint blast as the car had disintegrated. The man to whom the house belonged, a person she knew well, now smiled warmly at her as he motioned for a welcoming hug. The young woman proceeded into the man’s arms and embraced him like a brother.

“Aida, welcome back…” The man stepped out of the doorway to let her in.

“General, thank you, it was an easy trip, despite the interruption.” She stepped inside the home.

It was a normal looking home, just like any other, if you didn’t know the importance of whom it was housing. Aida carried the case under her arm now and followed the man through the entryway and into the living room. It, too, looked just like a normal home, with chairs centered around a coffee table, all facing a TV. The general, like the home, didn’t seem of any specific importance at all either. He was no taller than 5’8”, and didn’t wear any sort of military or formal clothes you might expect to find on a person who held the title of ‘general’. He had long black hair, and seemed to be of Spanish descent, although his voice, attitude, and choice of clothes didn’t reflect it. He was young, too, like Jade was. The general walked casually through the house, finally coming to a doorway to a library. It wasn’t large by any means, however it seemed to fit the needs of one who would like his own personal collections of important volumes.

The general pulled one of the books out of the front bookcase and opened it up. Cut out of a chunk of pages was a hole that perfectly fit the size and shape of a key inside. He closed the book and replaced it on the bookshelf after having removed the key. He now moved to the bookcase on the right side of the room, where he flipped open the spine to a hardback book labeled “Ishmael”, revealing a keyhole as well as a number pad. Into the keyhole he inserted the key he had removed from the previous book, and upon the keypad he typed 2-0-1-2.

Aida heard the release of the locks inside of the bookcase she had been in many times.

“M’lady, please…” The eastern general bowed his head slightly and motioned his hand towards where just a moment ago a case full of books had been; now there was only a dimly lit entryway leading down a flight of stairs. Jade proceeded down the dimly lit stairway into the basement of the home which had been modified to have no other entrances.

A Doctor’s Tale

“Oh god please dont die! I cant help u here, please, just one more minute, I promise…” She thought to herself as the patient was wheeled rapidly into the wide elevator she had become so accustomed to. “The beeping of the heart rate, the nurses pumping the air into her lungs, and I here, at the elevator’s pannel pressing the button for the 4th floor as rapidly as if it were a manual charger on this lady’s life.” She sighed and looked down at the gourney, her face showing an empathetic plea for the woman’s soul to just stay in a few moments longer. “honey, I cant help you here, I can only help in the O.R. just a few more moments…”

The elevator chimed and sounds flooded the elevator as the preped doctors rushed in to try and save this womans life. She was used to it, and ran right along side the gourney the whole way, she always thought she felt her soul connect with the patients, and that maybe if she asked for them to be okay, they would be. Lights flick on brighter as the woman is wheeled under them. Her whole head is wrapped in blood-soaked gauze, shouts for amounts of medication and the clicking of machines turning on all to assist this one life. Out of billions of lives on the planet it seemed that this life was the most important right now. It always amazed her how quickly she sprung into action but this time she surprised herself because she was ready and beginning even quicker than before.

This time it was different though, instead of listening to her shouts, everyone was listening to Eric, her good friend, and everyone pushed her out of the way. She caught a glimpse of a familiar face outside the room, but all patients families have forgetable faces and even look alike. She shrugged it off and reached for the foreceps as someone else grabbed them before she could. Eric unraveled the bandaging, slowly, meticulously, as she stepped up, not sure why she wasnt leading this one, but ready to do whatever it took to help save a life. She seemed too slow, her usual movements were weighted and everything happened around her both slower and faster than usual.

Tina grabbed the lady’s hand and poked it gently with a needle, attempting to establish if there is brain damage. Eric removed the womans bandages and hung over her, examining her obviously extreme head wound. Another nurse shined a light into the woman’s eyes, hoping that they would respond to the light change. “She’s fixed and set!” Something nobody liked hearing, that meant that her pupils werent responding to light and her eyes werent moving, these are our two most primitive functions and if we arent doing them then the brain trauma is severe. The x-rays were put on the light board and it was clear that the woman had 2 clots in her head which were leaking blood into her skull and causing her brain to swell up severely, basically her brain was growing in her skull, crushing the tissue inside. The first thing would be to poke holes through her skull to relieve the pressure, and get in and remove the clots.

Just as they were about to start she noticed something very odd. She wasnt operating or at all near the gourney, she was, however, on the other side of the room. “Karen, Karen…. Karen!” Eric called out as the patient’s heartrate went ‘flatline’. “Karen! No, Karen!” He was shouting her name at this woman’s lifeless body. And as they performed CPR, she finally saw the face of the patient. Through the swollen eyelids and the cuts in her face, she saw it was her face there on the table. It was her mother outside the operating room, and somehow this was her, standing outside herself. She couldnt understand what it was she was seeing until her memory threw her a fast one. She had been driving down the road to work and stopped at a red light. Listening to Alanis Morisette, the light turned green and she went. A semi-truck had ran a red and careened right into her side of the car.

She could feel the pressure on her chest as Eric shoved his hands down onto it, she heard the crack of her ribs, but they didnt hurt. She was watching it all from a distance and yet somehow still lightly feeling everything. She watched as the monitor read flat and a very tired Eric gasped out and was gently tugged away from her dead body. “Motor vehicle accident victim Karen Scott’s pronounced time of death… 3:12 am…” Everything around her became very blurry and smudged and mashed togehter in color. Then the colors faded and she felt a unity with the things and the people that had been in the room with her. All senses left her and there was nothing around her. But she could feel inside everything that was alive on the planet, and she was -apart- of it all. And she was content, for she was everyone and everything on the planet. For the first time ever, she just -was-.

The Teenager

It was a day, like every other, there was nothing wrong and the world was in perfect balance. The alarm clock next to his bed went off at exactly the same time it should. The exact same time it had everyday of school that year, and the past four years at this school. He flicked on the light on his bedside table and sat up, his legs moving out and off the bed, his feet flat on the floor, he ran his hands through his thick brown hair and sighed. He rubbed his eyes and shook his head.

“Daaaaaamn…” He sighed. The same thoughts going through his brain that always were in there every school morning. Such as “why bother?”, “will it ever end?”, and “is this, or something like it, what im doomed to live forever?”. He stood up and smoothed his boxer-briefs and stretched his arms above his head. He walked over to his closet and grabbed an over shirt and picked his pants off the ground, slipping them onto his waist. He left it unzipped and unbuckled until he had sorted through his dressor for a regular shirt to put on and tuck into his pants. Once on, he buttoned and zipped up his pants around the bottom of his green shirt and threw on the long sleeve cream-colored overshirt. His wallet chain dangled and clanged against his black jean shorts as he made his way into his bathroom.

He glared at the face in the mirror, tried to tame his hair, and began to brush his teeth. Outside the door his cat cried, as usual, but today it was really annoying him. He opened the door and yelled at the cat, with a mouth full of toothpaste, to get inside. He finished brushing and used the bathroom, then making his way downstairs. He always felt better after breakfast. His fake, but better, world of dreams making him want to retreat back to un-reality. Would subside as soon as the cereal and cold milk hit his empty stomach. So, he started making the bowl of cereal as he had every morning, awaiting his mind to calm down and accept the real.

As he poured the carton of milk, he was literally blown back by the enormous feeling he got in his chest. He had dropped the carton and it was spilling out everywhere, he almost slipped on the milk as he clutched his chest. It felt like something was compressing his ribcage from the front, he could feel his ribs had snapped and his head felt like it was going to explode. In the back of his mind he could hear a girl screaming and it got louder and louder. He cupped his hands over his ears and soon the scream became all he heard, all he was. Then suddenly, as fast as it had started, it all was gone.

He was kneeling in a pool of milk and he was hunched forward with his hands over his ears. There was a ringing in his head for a few minutes after the fact. He grabbed rags and paper towels to wipe up the milk mess in his kitchen. He used the last of the carton on his bowl of cereal.

He was left with too many questions that morning, and the bowl of cereal didnt help to clear his head. He walked out to his bus stop as he always did, looking at the very familiar and cold surroundings of the early morning. He passed the people who were there before him, the faces he was so familiar with by now. He enjoyed them being there everyday, but he had not once in four years said a word to any of them. He found irony in it, but shrugged it off, cranking up the volume on his MP3 player. Through the blasting music his brain still found a way to think hard about everyone and everything around him.

He bobbed his head extra hard to his music, subconsciously hoping to knock loose the terrible thoughts and feeling racing through his mind. The school bus drove on and he thought, as he had all year, how sad it was that a high school senior was riding the goddamned -school- bus. But he knew that at least five other kids on there were seniors too, but they were all losers and he felt horrid sinking down to their level, being equal with them, even for just a moment as they rode the bus. Getting off the bus was no real treat either, because everyone was greeted by people. His friends all waited in the cafeteria for his arrival. No welcome commitee for him, it probably made him seem to others like he didnt have tons of friends. So, he made his way down the hallways and into the cafeteria where he was greeted by his friends with nods, hugs, and hello’s.

He spent his fifteen minutes of bullshitting with his friends as he always did. But something was definately missing. He didnt know what it was, or maybe he was afraid to think about what it was. The bell rang and he and his friends made their way as a group down the main hallway, everyone branching off here and there until it was just him again. Then he remembered what it was that was missing. His best friend and love, he had not seen her this morning, and she wasnt waiting by his locker when he went to get his art sketchbook. He wearily made his way towards his artroom. Before he reached the room, though, he saw one of the vice principals and a cop were at the doorway, they were talking to his teacher. He hadnt been a very bad kid but he skipped sometimes and did a few other bad things he didnt remember. So he was abit scared that they were there for him. He tried to just walk in, hoping the entire time that they wouldnt say his name. Through the blared music he heard his teacher calling after him.

He removed his headphones and paused his music, getting scared as he turned around. The principal looked at him and said his name. He nodded and the principal told him to follow them. The cop walked next to the school official. So he walked a few paces behind them, his head hung low. They brought him into one of the offices they have and told him to have a seat. He had been in this same office a few years earlier for the theft of a computer mouse from the writing center. This office was not of happy times or things. He could smell it in the air and he could feel it in the walls that surrounded him now. The principal sighed and said his name. He was waiting for him to say “Now I hate punishing people, but…” or “I dont like being the bad guy, you know…” but instead he said “I am afraid I have some terrible news…”

He wasnt sure how to handle this, he realized he wasnt in trouble but he wondered what it was that was so bad. And immediately he got the answer. “Your friend…” the principal spoke his love’s name. “…got into a car accident this morning around seven fifteen. She was in a head-on collision with a semi-truck. She was helivaced with her father to the hospital. She… umm… she died on the way to the hospital. I’m so sorry…” The principal seemed ready to go into tears. “The -fucking- principal didnt -fucking- know her!” he thought as his eyes vision blurred and the tears ran down his face.

He just couldnt handle it, he collapsed to his knees, onto the floor. He screamed “Nooooooo!!!!” As his hands went to his eyes. He removed his glasses and set them on the ground next to him. He felt like he couldnt breathe. She was all he was, he was her, and she was him. He -loved- her and she loved him. Over a year of knowing each other and she was ripped away from him. All the happy moments that could have been and would be, now just impossibilities, and dreams. He could feel the discomfort of the officer and the principal as they wondered how they’d comfort him. The principal said “Im letting you take the next three days off, absent free. They wont count against you, and we’ll have a mention of her and a moment of silence. As well as posts about her service all around the school.”

At this he wiped his eyes and said “No… dont post any bulletins or mention her. I dont want people who didnt know her to go to her service. I will give you a list of all the people she knew. Nobody knew my….” He whispered her name and almost broke down again “… the way I did…” He grabbed his glasses and held them in his hand knowing he wouldnt soon stop crying. He knew that he had felt her pain this morning. That it was her scream he had heard. The last sound he will ever hear from her….

The teenager’s eyes shot open as he awakened. His eyes immediately looking up at all the faces peering down at him from his headboard. He didnt have to scan all of the photos, his eyes immediately went to a set of four pictures. They were of him hugging a girl, of him kissing the girl, a full picture of her at a restaurant, and one of her and another girl. He looked at all four of them and smiled as his eyes moved back to the full body picture of the girl.

The teenager sat up and reached out to the picture as if he could feel her skin or hair. He smiled again as he lowered his hand. “Good morning…” he said her name. He leaned forward and kissed the picture. As he sat back he smiled and said “I love you.”

This had become his routine every morning since the accident. He didnt like thinking how long ago it had been, how long he had been without his love for. He knew it hadnt been too long, and if her thought about it he would just start crying.

He had loved her, she had loved him, they were in love, and going to get married someday, although they almost never discussed it, they both knew it and felt it. For him, hugging her was like holding everyone he had ever loved. When he kissed her, it was like tasting the best things life has to offer. And when he could smell her, it was like poking his head through heaven’s clouds. She smelled the way heaven should smell. She was intoxicating. He lived off of her, he loved off of her, he was her and she was him. And he, he had to wake up every morning, the dreams of her subsiding, knowing that he would never feel any of that again…

Everywhere he moved from there he kept his bed low to the ground, and kept his wall of pictures all in the exact same place. Over the years, after all the places he had seen he still hung onto those times, to his love. Whether she would want him to move on or not didnt matter to him, he would never quit loving her, and every morning, without fail, he would greet his love with a good morning and a kiss. Just as he should have been able to do had she lived. He woke up every morning next to her, even if it wasnt the way he had planned. It was the only way he would let himself awaken. Until one day, years down the line when his former self was wrinkled and old, battered and beaten, and becoming more and more useless to society’s grip, he would go to sleep.

And he would awaken next to his love’s face. Only she would actually be there, just as he remembered her, his own skin and hair just as it used to be, in his old room from so many years earlier. She would tell him she’d been waiting for him, and she would kiss him like she’d always been afraid to. She would tell him she had been waiting a long time for him. They would make love, and every morning he would wake up next to her, his arms around her. He would be able to smell her always and taste her forever. He never wanted her to leave him. He had been without her for so long, he would and could never lose her again, and never again would they be apart…

The Guillotine

The man looked down at the cleanly-cut watermelon that lie before him. He smiled at it, for it looked so delicious, but he wasnt hungry for it, for he had just eaten. In the basket lay, also various other fruits such as cantalope, honeydew melon, and pineapple. All nicely cleaved in two. And all around and in the basket was strawberry juice, and the bits and pieces of strawberries here and there.

It was so delightful to look at this basket that he almost didnt hear the crowd around him shouting. “Murderer!” “Thief” they shouted at him in disgust. It was sad, really, that they figured they needed to make his last moments before his punishment worse. Well more than likely a few of them that Henry could see, now, would be in his same position, guilty or not.

Henry tried again at the bonds that held his hands behind his back, but to no avail once again, and attempted to adjust his groin upon the bench that he was face-down on. This made little difference as well. He looked at the pieces of skull and grey matter that lie on the ground, bench and basket before him. He made himself pretend that it and the surrounding red liquid was just strawberry juice.

The executioners mask gave no sign of mercy as the man behind it held the rope to the guillotine taut. As the wind blew it seemed like the rope was being tugged and it made Henry flinch every time it moved. He still couldnt believe that this was really happening. He had only just last night been on his couch, at home, sleeping, with David Letterman on in the background. He woke up this morning, in a jail cell, with a headache and a death sentence. He still didnt know what he had done wrong. But he supposed he would be told just before he was to be killed. They had given him his last meal, so at least that was like the movies, so maybe this was a dream.

Henry hoped that this was a dream, but he knew that it felt just too real. Everything was too normal and realistic, and he could feel the texture of everything, it couldnt be a dream. His neck rested upon the ‘u’ that was cut out for it. Finally the local official called quiet and spoke

“This man, is being sentenced to death, for crimes against society. He quit his job with heresy in his mind: that he could and would not contribute to the greater good that is our wonderful society. He chose to not procreate, to add to our society, nor even collect our generous givings of our Financial Benefits. His mind is rotten, and now he is no use to us. For this, Henry, you shall be sentence to death by guillotine.”

“What the hell??” Henry thought. “How did they know I gave up?” Henry remembered spending days in his cubicle, a .45 in the drawer, ready for him to put to his forehead as soon as someone agitated him. He didnt get bothered, however. Not by -anyone-. He didnt understand why, until now. They must have wanted or needed him. So they waited for him to come around, but instead he made the ultimate mistake, in their eyes, and just left. He didnt file unemployment or for Social Security Disability. He just didnt want to be apart of -this- society anymore. But this was the only society on the planet, so he spent every waking moment everyday trying to figure another option. Henry couldnt figure out how it was that they had gotten him here, or why they chose to kill him in this method, hell, he didnt even know who ‘they’ were. All he knew was he had to get out of there, and fast.

Henry looked down, again, at the ’strawberries’ that were around, and he wondered why it was that a guillotine would sever -any- grey matter, it was designed to sever the neck, wasnt it? He remembered from his history classes many years earlier that they were indeed intended to sever at the neck. “Did someone maybe try and escape as the blade fell? What the hell other explaination for it is there?” Henry thought.

The executioner moved a few paces closer and grabbed hold of Henry’s legs. He flipped Henry over, onto his back, and said to him ”Here’s why…” as he pulled the cord. The 20 pound steel blade dropped straight at Henry’s eye-level. It seemed to drop both quickly and slowly at once. He heard the screams of every person executed by this blade, become louder and louder as it got closer. Just as it was to sever his nose, Henry caught a glimpse of wording on the broad side of the blade, facing the crowd. It read simply “Learn and Serve”.

The Suicide

The police officer looked at the gruesome scene. It was much worse than all the other ones, it was just downright disturbing. Even the many years of crime scene responses, couldnt prepare him for what he saw now. A male probably in his early to mid-twenties had jumped off the roof of a building onto the wraught-iron gate below. The disturbing thing, though, was that he had jumped face-first, and had impaled himself on the fence. One bar had gone through his forehead, another through his neck, one in his right shoulder and another through his chest. He had fallen so far that the force snapped his spine and his body now made a sort of sideways “L” on the fence. His legs and lower body were only partially jammed into the fence, so his broken limbs hung loosely off of the black, now blood soaked, fencing. It had been the twenty seventh suicide in the last two weeks. The cop couldnt understand what could make so many college-age and teenagers kill themselves. He shrugged it off, took a sip of his coffee, and returned to his patrol car, getting out the necessary paperwork that he would spend the rest of the day filling out, with a smile on his face, and go home to his wife and kids, go to sleep, wake up, put on his uniform, smiling, and do it all again…

Michael woke up from his dream, sweating, and ran to the bathroom as he vomitted, some of it missing the toilet. It had been the third day in a row that these dreams had been around. Just a week ago he’d graduated with his bachelors in medical science, top of his class. His girlfriend, Jess, had been there along with his family. He looked back at it and realized it was just after this that he started not sleeping well. His dreams were of a mechanical world, where everybody did just as they were told, and nobody had a personality, they were just drones to a dirty, hatred-plagued invisible evil. And the thing that made him sick was that they all did it with a smile on their faces. They smiled in this lifeless existance of nothing. He couldnt remember this last dream, though, it faded from him as soon as he began brushing his teeth. He looked over at the vomit around the toilet bowl and almost gagged knowing that the thing that made him do it was too horrible for him to want to think about.

It was about two more hours before he had to go be up to see his girlfriend. But he didnt feel like going back to sleep, or sitting around his apartment. So he cleaned off his toilet, got dressed, tied his shoes and walked out the door, smiling, for some reason he couldnt comprehend. He tried to stop and couldnt. So he started thinking about it, he was smiling because he had a girlfriend who loved him, who had graduated medical school, and was a nurse at a local hospital, he had graduated with his BA and would be working at Clearlan Medical. He had alot of money saved up and would be getting a place with Jess, and begin his life. Suddenly his smile vanished. He was starting his life, his next 50 years or so ahead of him. He was walking around down the dark streets in the middle of a cool fall night. His feet crunched the leaves that were all over, and he smiled at the beauty of it all. He walked and walked, his mind both empty and full. He couldnt figure out why his face smiled but his soul screamed inside him. He had walked so far thinking on this, he had reached Clearlan and looked up at it. Trees were here and there, swaying in the cool nights breeze, and the mowed lawn was being sprayed by the sprinkler system that ran under it. And suddenly his dream came back to him, so quickly he had to literally keep his balance.

The dream had had everyone he knew in it, all of them, smiling, and being a drone, working on huge mechanical equipments, and these machines helped to feed this giant being that was above them, it got bigger and bigger every moment and smiled down at all that was doing its bidding. It hadnt needed to tell anyone what to do, he had just planted the seed and let it spread. Nobody noticed this gigantic thing above them either. They didnt exactly know what it was they were doing or why, and none of them bothered to ask.

He had run around to everyone and asked them what they were doing and why and all of them just smiled and said “Isnt it a great day? Life is so good, I have a family, and a great work ethic about my job, life is great, dont you think so?” Jess, his mom, his dad, everyone had that ridiculous smile on their faces, and couldnt think at all. They were drones, slaves, and worst of all, they couldnt see it at all! They were so blind and were so engrained into their lives that they didnt even know what or why they were doing what they did. And they didnt -care-!

He was the only one who saw them feeding this huge creature that oversaw everything with just as big a smile as everyone he commanded. The creature frowned and grabbed hold of him and he was incredibly dwarfed by this things size. Its skin was covered with slime and it smelled like rotting bodies. Inside its slightly transparent body he could -see- the bodies of dead people being digested. The thing smiled to him and said “Why are you distressed, little one?” and Michael pointed down to it all. “Nobody thinks! Everyone is just being a brainless drone!” and the thing said “But they’re all happy, look at their faces, talk to them, they are more content and happy than ever, now that they have a purpose. You’re young, but you just graduated college, you will soon start your job here, and you’ll soon have the same smile on your face. You’ll wake up everyday, do your job, go home to your family, and goto sleep, wake up and do it again. You will be happy until the day you die, I promise. Look at all these people…” the thing pointed to its stomach “… they all died but their death brings in new ones who can work in their place, and be happy. These people in here dont have smiles on their faces, because as they got older they couldnt work very much, and many of their family members died or moved on. But they were content in death because they lead a perfectly content life. You will have the same experience, but dont worry about that now, here, go out there and do your job you so love. Get money for your family to survive. Be happy that you’ve achieved the goals you wanted for yourself.”

Michael squirmed as the creature put him down at the hospital he was to work at in the real world. He saw all the doctors and patients smiling and he realized, that no matter how how much schooling you goto, it didnt matter, you would still spend the rest of your days as society’s drone. The only difference schooling made was that you would be able to control other people, instead of being completely controlled. But the fact was, everyone has a boss and everyone has to follow their orders, and if you dont work, and feed society, you didnt get money, you didnt eat. And only if you work your ass off will you be rewarded with lots of money and respect for society. Everyone will smile upon you for helping to feed the greater being better than the mediocre people. This was his realization, for in his dream, his mechanical world was slowly transforming to the real world as he thought more. But if he squinted, he could seen the machinery that fed the giant creature. And everywhere he went he could smell the foul reek of the creature that smiled and breathed its rancid breath upon everone. This is what had made him sick, this is why he had been so disturbed. He realized he had spent these last years in college just so that he could control people more than be controlled by other people. His years of schooling brought him closer to the creature, society, it breathed its rancid breath upon him as it smiled, for he had done exactly what he was bred to do. Work hard for the ‘greater good’ of society, so that maybe you can be a little less of a slave than everyone else.

Before Michael knew it, he was walking past the wrought-iron entrance to the hospital, he had swiped his card and was inside. A few people had he knew had nodded to him, but all he could see was a lifeless smile on their face. He felt the hot breath of the creature above him, and he knew he could smell its breath, it was everywhere, it was less on the patients, more on the doctors who had worked so hard to become abit less of a slave, and control people abit more than they would have. It made Michael sick, everyone stank, and he swallowed back the chunks rising in his throat as he entered the elevator. He pressed ‘roof’ on the pannel, not really knowing what he was doing. He was crying but he was both happy and sad at the same time. He wouldnt let himself be like everyone else, he would be free, but he was sad because he knew that everyone he knew would never have this realization.

He felt content inside because, altough he was stripping away all he knew and was used to, he was slowly feeling that this was the right thing. That he wasnt being a sheep, that he was starting to be like the trees and the butterflies who just lived life. These things had no currency, politics, or religion, they were all perfectly content to just eat, sleep, procreate, and repeat the process, because thats all that was needed.  Their lives were simple and beautiful. Not complicated and dramatic, like our human lives had come to be. The Elevator reached the top, where the helicopters airlifted people in, Michael wiped the tears from his eyes, and he was now smiling inside, he felt free, and very happy. He walked to the edge of the roof and looked down at the fence and ground below him. About twenty stories down, was his release. He hoped he would set an example for what people should be. That this body, this society of hard work and drama didnt make us or hold us here, that there was so much more. This body wasnt necessary and that we must shed it to just truly exist.

A cold wind hit him, nature accepting his return to it and all the things on the planet. He saw the beautiful trees and the grass, but he then saw how we’d just taken them for ourselves, putting irrigation systems under it, and building large structures everywhere we wanted, because we’re not content with what we cannot control. Even this slight bit of engineering on this hospital and the lawncare system showed that people hate being controlled, and know deep down that we’re slaves, so we try and micromanage what we can. And this is the only way we know we can control. By destroying what has always been there, and putting in its place, monuments to our detachment from the real. In trying not to be slaves we still do what society, the big creature, wants, which is to overrun and forget what we all can -feel- everytime we take a hike in the wilderness, or go hunting, or fishing, or rafting.

The wind blew in Michael’s face and he closed his eyes for a moment and whispered “Goodbye jess… I hope you dont become like everyone else. I love you… but this is what we all need to learn. We need to lift the veil from our eyes and see whats really there. Goodbye…” He spread his arms out next to him and pushed off the edge of the hospital. He opened his eyes and smiled as he could feel the release just a moment away. He felt for a split second the bars jamming into his body, but instantly everything around him vanished….

Drip, drip, drip ran the blood, like a sadistic clock counting every second of the child’s death. The cop stood on the other end of the room as so many others had the world over had stood near the bodies of the dead people. The cop couldnt shake off the feeling in the air. It wasnt just the smell and feel of death that hung in the air, but something else also, some feeling of release, redemption, freedom. The officer walked over to the teenager’s desk and read the note written on it. The note itself had an eerie feel to it too, for it was the same note that had shown up at thousands of people’s crime scenes. A mass suicide had run rampant the world over but there was nothing in common with any of the victims, no common cult, or chat room, or chain email. No church, no belief no occupation, no age, no race nor gender. The cop handed the note to the lead investigator as he walked in.

“The voice of the earth calls to me. I can hear her pain, feel her panick. The disasters and deaths she has brought about is a sign. The poison in our blood must be released. She will bleed us of it. Only within bleeding do we know how to die. Only in dying do we truly know how to live.”

The investigator looked at the kid on the bed and the crimson sheets surrounding him, shaking his head. What the hell is going on with the world? The investigator asked himself. The child had cut himself all over his body, mostly small cuts, but the deepest being in his neck and wrists. It was hard to see past the cut and blood stained skin to see a person under it all. The kids parents had found him when they got home from work. What a terrible loss for the world, what potential he may have had.

“Get him in a body bag, and contact the FBI, tell them we have the latest victim.” The FBI figured this was a mass suicide based on some occult following or religious prophet telling everyone to release themselves. Yeah thousands of people from all ages races, religions, and lifestyles just killing themselves for some asshole who says we all need to drink the cool-aid, it doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure something else is going on here. The investigator walked over to the body, whom, it seemed was smiling blissfully, ever staring towards the sky. Christ, he’s so young. The investigator closed the eyelids of the child and walked out of the room, feeling as if there was now something pressing upon his shoulders. He shrugged off the feeling that something was pressing upon him as just nerves.

“When two realities combine, they create two alternate sub-realities. Wake up and smell the burning teeming masses. Wake up, open your eyes, and see what is beyond the haze of this universe.”

The investigator had woken up with a start, slipping his hands through his hair. Jesus Christ… the dark haired man sighed and rolled over cuddling down in his covers. The images he saw and the voice he heard still haunted his ears and eyes. What the hell was that all about??? I’ve been studying the Mosley case too closely is all… just need to take a breather.

Johnathan rolled around a few times until he was convinced he wouldnt soon be falling asleep. He slipped on the fuzzy slippers an old ex gave him, Embarassing to be seen wearing, but comfy as hell, Johnathan always thought when he slipped them on. He walked down the stairs, the newspaper clippings lining his hallway and all the walls down the stairway and leading all through the living room and into the kitchen.
The haunted and twisted faces of the black and white people along his walls all greeted him with sliced faces and bloody smiles. It had more than consumed him, he knew that, but these dreams had only started just a week ago. It had been just after I had seen that dead kid in his room, with the same damn note i’ve seen at these suicides a dozen times. John walked into his kitchen, determined that if he were gonna be awake he might as well wake up fully and get to work.
He made some of his basic coffee and sat down on what had been his couch before the piles of newspapers, computer print outs, criminal profiles, victim profiles, and random junkfood wrappers, cans and boxes had engulfed it. Most of his house looked just like his couch, save his kitchen and bedroom, both of which had enough other things thrown about them to make them too unrecognizable.
John sipped on his coffee and pulled up the nearest manilla folder. It, just like everything else in the house, had been read and re-read a billion times over by the investigator and yielded no more clues than before. Just as John sipped his coffee cup down to the halfway mark he heard something behind him. Dont bother reading any of that rubbish, you will find nothing there johnnyboy. The voice sounded like it both came from behind him and from the back of his brain. John stood up and looked around, switching on the dining room lights. There was nothing there but the blissfully dead faces to greet him from his walls.
John turned around and sighed, but just as he did, he noticed something was amiss. One of the many pieces of paper was different. It was the one above his microwave, he couldnt quite place it from afar so he wlaked closer to it. Staring at it a moment he couldnt figure out what it was. John reached out to touch it and as if it was acknowledging that he was onto something, the picture’s eyes shifted to center on John’s now quickly retracting hand.
“Jesus Christ!” He has nothing to do with this John. And trust me he never has had anything to do with anything ever. “What the…?” And just as he thought that he couldnt be any more scared, or crazy, all the eyes in all the rooms of his house centered on him, they all made a noise simultaneously, like something running at mach speed through his house, rustling every sheet of paper it passed in an instant.
Its a mass consciousness Johnathan, it is the only thing binding us. Each and every one of us is tied to it, but it does not tie us down. It is what releases us from this prizon we have created. It is something not just we all in this house have, but every human being has. Think Johnathan, sleep on it and let the answers come to you….

Johnathan woke up again from his sleep, the cup of coffee he had been drinking was still on his couch, with the manilla envelope wide open next to it, and he could smell his now stale bagel he was microwaving when he fell asleep at his dining room table hours earlier.
It was noon before Johnathan had gotten his suit and coat on to go to work. It was another day, just like every other had been the last three months. It was overcast and raining randomly, and most people went about their lives seemingly unaware of what went on around them. They didnt seem to notice that the sky had looked exactly the same for months on end, or that thousands of people had and were going to be killing themselves in the same way daily. Nobody seemed to care, it was if they were saying Screw it, so what if people are dying in huge quantities, im still alive, and i have a purpose in this world, my 40 hour a week job and my family to support, that doesnt change because the world seems like it might be ending.

John drove down the road thinking and chuckling at his probably perfect quotation on people’s thoughts these days. John had no family to support and he could give a damn about the paychecks, he need to figure out what was going on, and why, not only for his own sanity’s sake, but possibly for the sake of the world. Yeah right John, even if you do find anything out, I guarantee you wont be saving anyone. He thought to himself, shaking off the thought that deep down all he was worried about was his own unexpected and bloody demise.

Awakening

Awakening

A young man sat upon a park bench. It was mid-afternoon and it was a cool fall day. The young man was terribly troubled; his life hadn’t turned out the way he had wanted it to, he had a dead-end job, no significant other, and was consumed by the hatred of the past that haunted him still. He sat with his hands through his hair, and his head bowed, looking at his dirty shoes. He wanted to cry, to scream, to hurt someone, to hurt himself. But he simply sighed, again and again, he simply sighed.

Another man walking through the park saw this clearly troubled young man and wanted to ask him what the problem was, and to see if he could help. The man walked up to the young man sitting on the bench and spoke in a soft voice

“Excuse me, young man, may I ask you what seems to trouble you so?”

The young man glanced ahead at the legs of this stranger and was once again sent into inner torment, asking himself what this person was doing intruding into his life, and how dare he ask him what was the matter. But he again only sighed, and decided to give a simple answer

“Sir, I am simply lost. It feels like I am spiraling away from myself. And that the

universe is spiraling away from me as well. I am a shell of the man I was, and all this time has done nothing for me but given me contempt for myself and spite towards the world.”

“Young man, may I suggest something? If you don’t mind, I would like to have a seat next to you, that is, if I am not intruding.”

The young man merely looked over at the empty spot next to him and shrugged. The man took this as a sign of acceptance and gently took a seat next to the troubled youth.

“I must ask you, why it is that you feel this way?” The man asked.

“I don’t know. I just do. My life seems to be all screwed up and beyond my help or repair.”

“But, young man, it is –your- life. Is it not true that if your life is not where you want it to be, that only you can change it?”

The young man was angry at this comment and responded accordingly.

“Oh, so my childhood being ruined is my fault? And what about the fact that I was ill-prepared for the world because of my childhood? The fact that everyone I know has abandoned me and that I have no future because of that is, all my fault? Huh? Well is it?”

The man paused for a moment, not collecting his thoughts, but merely waiting until he knew the young man was actually listening.

“No, your ruined childhood was not your fault, and neither was your subsequent ill-preparation for life as an adult. However it is your fault that you have not let it go since you gained control of your life. And because you wouldn’t let it go, or move on, you pushed away everyone you knew. You pushed them away as you wallowed in your sorrow, placing blame on everything and everyone but yourself. And so you were consumed by only your hatred and sadness, not at your past, but at yourself. Consumed by contempt for yourself for not trying to look beyond the illusion of your past controlling you, and seeing what truly is; and that, young man, is your fault.”

The young man was astounded. He was infuriated, relieved, shocked, scared; this stranger had just hit straight into him and seemed to know him completely, though they had never met. The young man was reeling from the statement of blindingly painful truth. He sat back and sighed again, closing his eyes. He saw the images that haunted him still, and he knew they would not likely ever fade away, but he understood now that his fear had kept him from truly living. He had feared all and in his fear grew hatred and he had become a bitter and lonely man. He suddenly realized that he had been a man, in control of his life for several years, and had done absolutely nothing with that power.

He opened his eyes again and it seemed as if the park had changed. The colors were the same, as were the sounds and the people moving about within it, but it seemed like he had always been looking at the world through a dirty window, and finally he had opened the window and climbed through it. The man next to him slid a hand-held mirror in front of the young man’s line of vision. The young man saw himself in the reflection, but it was not the same person he had seen all the years before. The person that looked at him now wore a smile, and seemed to have full confidence in his abilities. His blue eyes glowed with a hunger for knowledge and experience that had so far been denied to him.

The young man looked at the corner of the mirror’s reflection; at the face of the man who sat next to him. He had to look over at the man and see for himself what he could not believe he had seen in the mirror. He had until now not even looked at the stranger’s face, but now that he had, and now understood why this man knew him.

The man who sat next to him now, was himself. An older version of himself, but it was unmistakably he. The older version of himself simply smiled from behind his sunglasses, nodded slowly, and vanished before the young man’s eyes.

His life had now begun…

Sages

Peering through teary eyes, I look over at where my sages had been. Only emptiness fills the vacuum left by their former presence.

“This isn’t the way it was supposed to be!” I cry out to the darkness around me.

“The fact that this is how things have become prove it was supposed to be this way.” The memories of those who once filled the void answer back.

My sages, my wise ones. They connected me to spirit and consciousness I hadn’t experienced.

“I thought you would always be there. We all said you would…” I sobbed uncontrollably, floating through the abyss.

“Those were merely words. Words that fell and were unnoticed like a single grain of sand. Our actions are what survive eternity; our words will forever be lost.” The memories echoed back.

They had been around for as long as I can remember. Parts of a whole, we were. Both physical, mental, emotional, spiritual. Whole. It was Nirvana when we were around. We were able to shake hands, hug, hold, love, and be. It was an all-consuming feeling.

“I cannot do this alone. I am so alone…” I let the wave of anger get supressed by sadness as another wave of tears rolled down my face.

“If you cannot, then you will perish. A long, slow, painful deah. Emotional death, spiritual death, then eventually your physical self shall perish. Is this what you wish?” My brain rattled from the bluntness of the statement.

The anger came out now. No longer contained.

“You all left me! You are gone! I am all alone and you wish me dead! You want me to suffer without you! You are selfish.” I screamed.

“Yes, anger, let it out. It’s healthy. Selfish? Who is selfish? The ones who leave to continue their own journies, or the man crying for others to change and alter their lives to be apart of his? You should really understand your language’s definitions before spouting them out.” The memories and the void seemed to sneer at me. Mocking me.

It had been many long years. We had experienced every journey there was to imagine, and still we had held together, still had limitless adventures to undergo.

I didnt speak.

“Silence? Do not mistake your silence for acceptance. You are far from that. You must understand what has happened. Allow the emotions to come through, and run their course. If you will not speak on your own, how about a question? If we are gone, then to whom are you speaking?”

The question seemed simple to begin with, I was going to give the simple and obvious answer. I paused. Then answered anyway, to test my theory.

“I am talking to myself…”

“Yes, yes you are. But why is it that you are being answered in ways you would not answer yourself?”

“Because… it doesn’t matter if you are here or not. I know exactly what you will say. I already have the wisdom that I thought I needed you around to inbue me with. You have already given me that gift, and it can never leave.”

“Like a scar. For better or worse, it will always be there, and everytime you see it, you will have all the same memories you had as if it had just happened. Our impressions on you had no effect on physical proximity or how often we spoke. Just by having the experiences we have had together, we have made a permanent version of each other in each of our consciousness”

I sat up. I could see the circular floor under me. The void passed by as I stood on the platform. I was no longer drifting through darkness, and now gliding through the unknown. The pedestals where my sages had once stood were again visible.

“Allow us to be where we were and exactly what we were. A scar may make you smile and frown, but it will forever be there, and you must let it just be. Choose to enjoy the good memories, but understand the bad ones. Let them both pass through you effortlessly.”

I remembered each and every one of my sages, friends, my loves. Their faces, their voices, their spirits, their auras, their happiness, their sadness, their anger, their clothes, their skin, their love, their eyes, their consciousness, their words.

Each of the spots where they used to stand began to fill as I remembered each part of them.

Finally they were all there again, as if they had never left. All smiling.

There was an extra spot now, one that was open.

“Why is there an extra spot? Nobody is missing.”

My sages all laughed simultaneously.

“Nobody that you know yet is missing. You are naive but we didnt think you were -that- naive. Even if we were all going to always be together, you thought it would be -just- us?” They laughed again, then continued…

“That spot is just one, and once it is filled, it will lead you to circles beyond this one. Your spirit is old and you are wise beyond your years, but remember, you are still very young. Not even a quarter through your physical existence.”

I spoke now, smiling at the familiar faces that beemed at me.

“Thank you. I love you all so much. I love you more than anything. I love you more than anything can express.”

“I love you too.” They spoke in unison. “Remember us.”