(The following is a short story that I have
written in the style of an anonyms letter/ diary entry of a man trying to some
up his despair around his and the dreams of others. The character is someone
who is in his late 50’s approaching his 60’s and in a state of reflection over
what he considers his missteps in life.)
‘These aren’t the days I will be
remembered for.’ It’s something my dying grandfather said to me when I was a
child. And in these most recent of years it is something in private I have
often related to myself. I think of my dreams and aspirations, and how over
these past few years as my age has grown closer to his in the time of his
passing, these things which in many define a man, have in myself dwindled into
an incomprehensible decline.
As
this happened I have tried to this point vain to examine where I have gone
wrong. But even as I do so my mind wanders to that old man as my grandfather
was from what I remember of him, how even a simple man as he was would once
have had dreams an aspirations of his own. No man dreams to labor for others
but these roles must be filled and in time reality takes its toll until we
realize how we must all at some point in our lives accept some ill that maybe
out of our capacity to dictate. Yet these dreams do not simply disappear and
fade away. Instead they linger on, pushed to the back of our minds haunting us
constantly as puppets of our subconscious. These dreams linger in the eyes of
dreamers all around us. I see it in the eyes of those we pass aimlessly in the
streets, the tears in their eyes linger un-reaped, but it is they’re
unquestionably haunting their thoughts. The what ifs, the what’s that were and
the things that will never be. These things haunt my mind to an unquestionable
intensity.
And
yet I hear in others the excited gnashes and revelations of night dreams. These
unlike the dreams of reality are often seen with whimsical pretenses as though
they hold the deep secrets of life and the high importance of its meaning. They
show us new and other worlds not bound by the limits of our own intellect or
strains of our own societal falsies. Worlds in which we can take up the
presences of kings and queens, cities built in such grandeur that they be only
possible in comprehension with the power of the human psyche.
I
hear the stories of people who revel in these false paradises as if by even in
their projected illusions they have truly experienced these fantastical events.
In these revelations the author of these accounts always addresses the imagery
as opposed to the comprehension of the addressed events. Imagery, sounds and
smells, the way the objects felt and yet never a conscious comprehension of
these things. These all seem, (well at least to me) to be an after thought,
compiled and comprehended in review of the previous experiences. It is as
though the person themselves wasn’t in control of there actions, (or at least
to some part again, of those things around them).
So
you see like reality itself we are not truly in control of our own experiences
and foretold destinations. Although the surroundings may seem more desired than
those of the real world, there is still a strong surreal undertone of our
dreams that I myself believe to be caused by our lack of control in these very
personnel strangely idyllic settings. I know that many would question the
authenticity of such a statement and I do not wish to really attach my name to
this work for the chance it may ever leak out. But for those who are willing to
listen to the thoughts from a diary unknown then I will most certainly explain
the origins of my thinking.
It
began only a few years ago, before my interest had ever as much as wondered
about the origins of such small a microcosm as dreams. It had been a day like
any other; nothing had been out of the ordinary when I had gone to bed. But it
was deep into my sleep that I was suddenly transported to a graveyard and just
as sudden I realized I was at a funeral with no recollection of how I had
gotten to this place. I studied my surroundings but by my observations alone it
appeared I was the only one there. I noticed then that I was standing at a new
grave however I did not bend down to see the name as I was more concerned with
finding a friendly face of which one could hopefully tell me how I had got to
this place. But it was at this moment a young girl approached from the
distance. It was a strange moment as I stood there looking on. I had never seen
this child before but I remember thinking in the dream itself that I somehow
knew her. The girl, like myself was dressed in all black, it was clear then to
me that she must be a mourner of this empty funeral party of which I was a
part. As the girl approached my mind began to wander more away from its
previous contentions and more towards the origins of this young child who had
appeared as from all appearance I could comprehend, on her own.
When
the girl approached me she revealed something, which took me by surprise and
yet I was not taken aghast. The child revealed to me that I was her father and
that this was her mother’s funeral. I questioned the possibility of this child
being my own, looking into her eyes as she looked shyly at myself, with her
eyes every so often gazing down to the ground. I began noticing similarities in
her facial features to that of mine. She had deep brown eyes like my own,
although hers seem to be glistening in the light. Her hair was also a dark
brown which was much similar to how my own had been in my youth, before its
color had receded to its current state of a brown dusted grey. Because of these
similarities I came to the conclusion that this child must in fact be mine. So
at that moment I made a promise to my daughter that I would take care of her no
mater what, and that she would always be safe and loved in the care of her
father. Yet even as I did so I was not entirely convinced of my own abilities
to take care of this child. Being a father is a role of which I hadn’t put much
comprehension into. I began to worry of abilities to do this successfully but I
did, to myself at least, come to the decision that no matter how I felt that I
would do the best I could for this girl.
And
in the time that passed I began to accomplish this, the more time we spent
together the more I grew attached to her. My skills as a father also developed,
as my nerves were replaced with love and pride which in time ran in ways I have
never felt so. In my past work, which for reasons I shall keep my own will
remain secret, I have often felt that I was somehow not reaching the echelons
which I felt in myself and in my own abilities that I should and could be able
to achieve. Many a night such thoughts have kept me awake, as I would
re-examine past work in ways to better prepare myself for future ventures. And
yet here as a father I finally felt at peace, I was by no means an expert but I
was happy, I was doing well, and I cared for this child to a degree I had not
cared for anything or anyone since.
Yet,
at a latter point I returned home one day to find my daughter had gone. I began
at that point to search the house whilst calling her name, (which for all sense
and reason I can not remember in this state of reality). I searched upstairs in
bedrooms, bathroom and toilet but she was nowhere to be seen. More importantly
it was at this point I realized there was no sign of her or where she may
possibly have went. It was then that a deep feeling of dread began to grow
inside me. All manner of thoughts began to cross my mind and as suddenly this
great fear approached. I very much doubt that any words could comprehend these
feelings or emotions but for the point of my story I will attempt to encompass
them to some degree. The fear was greater than anything that I had previously
thought possible. As it grew inside of me it felt as though someone had held me
down and began ripping at my stomach. As the feelings grew pressure mounted and
it began to feel as though more sharp objects were being inserted into my
abdomen whilst at the same moment two heavyset men began a tug of war over my
intestines.
I
soon left my house to visit others to see if she had wandered to the home of a
friend or neighbor. I didn’t ring the police or even think of such a thing, my
mind was set on finding her and any other thought was a distraction that stood
between those chances. I talked to friends and family but no one had seen her.
It was at this time when my mind had become physically exhausted and my
anxieties at their peak that I awoke so intensely.
I sat up, still not having gained my
bearings of what had happened or where I was. After a few minutes I realized
that I was back in my bedroom and began to grasp the fictitious nature of my
past experiences. I began to re-examine in detail all of these personnel events
which, in my mind only had come to pass. The daughter I never had, the pride I
felt over the abstract projections of a fictitious fantasy. My mind had created
this paradise for me and had just as quickly snatched it away. I am by nature
not an emotional man, but I would find the world hard pressed not to shed a
tear as I myself did in the waking’s of this most bitter reality. It had all
felt so real at the time as I felt within the dream comprehensively analyzing
my situations and acting accordingly. This wasn’t a surreal stand off between
my conscious and subconscious, I wasn’t being dragged into a fantasy world
where I had no control as to the exterior surroundings, I was consciously
making decisions with real consequences, or... so I thought.
But
my true investment in the actions of my dream began to disrupt my thinking in
latter weeks. The loss of a child is an intense and horrifying notion for
anyone to comprehend, but to come to the realization that a child which from
your memories had existed only to be taken away violently from you into the
subconscious world of fantasy is something else altogether. For there can be no
grievance in such circumstances as the loss of a fictitious child from a
fictitious world. Such a scene would cause calls of others to shout of madness,
and to a degree rightly so. For the mothers, fathers, friends and family of
reality can happily grieve their loses but those who have lost out to our
dreams must sit and wait patiently to suffer in silence.
And
yet as the years have passed between that dream and now my life has turned in
wake, I still think back to those false memories and those events that took
place. I think of those days we spent with one another and the relative
security of my financial position in reality and nevertheless, I would give all
that away for one more chance to live within that world. I would give any and
all things to experience that place and live a life as the father I was again,
even in knowing that it all would not be real, I would still rather live that
way than be continually haunted by these dreams as others are in this reality
which we find ourselves in today. Not even to the worst of my enemies would I
curse to experience such a thing as this.
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