It's 6:11am.
Our Hero can't sleep. His sinuses keep swelling shut due to the allergies he has every summer.
An evil Mind Gremlin sneaks out the window, unseen by him, but the spell put upon him certainly worked.
Our Hero has been re-living the past. Certain, select days from the past, in a three-day block from 27 years ago. The way events unfolded in that memory, deep scars were dug, making them not easily forgotten.
The original events were difficult. Families, abuse, alcoholism, and anger. Lots of anger.
What the evil Mind Gremlin did was shine a bright light on that distant memory, highlighting it, calling it forth from the shadows, and forcing Our Hero to relive it over and over again. But this time, he began to fantasize about what he could have done differently. What he should have done differently.
It was the emotional equivalent to dumping a ton of gasoline-soaked straw on a dying fire.
Suddenly, Our Hero found himself in a battle inside his mind. Rage. He was consumed by rage as he thought about how he should have handled the situation. He should have thrown the man down on the ground and kicked the shit out of him. He should have beat him within an inch of his life. He should have beat down upon him the sum of all his resentments while accusing the man's mother of being responsible for all that was wrong at that moment.
Our Hero found himself in a battle with a ghost.
But this battle is pointless and stupid. He knows this. Or rather, he's supposed to know this. The spell put a fog on that knowledge. So after a few minutes of rage flowing around in his brainpan, he came up for air. He looked around his apartment and took a deep breath.
Then he focused on the moment in front of him. The present. The small actions of his fingers on the keyboard, the distant thunder of a storm that went around his village, the feel of the fan blowing in his hair.
So often, the solution to a problem is right in front of us. The present. What we're doing at that exact moment is far more powerful than any memory or dream or hope.
Our Hero doesn't own a time machine. He can't fix the past, re-do certain events, or fix the many mistakes he made. He can't foresee the future and he doesn't know the winning lottery numbers. But he can focus on the moment he is in, at that exact time, and he can do something about it.
It's 6:30am. Our Hero is still wide the fuck awake. His sinuses are still clogged and he can't breathe through his nose in order to sleep. But his head is quiet. The ghost is gone and he's left with the empty moments of his life, alone in his apartment, his fingers on the keyboard. It's the best he's got to work with right now and the best he can do.
He wonders, when his story gets re-told around the campfires, if this lesson will be included. Small victories in isolation in the middle of the night rarely are and it's a shame. They're usually the biggest victories of all.
Our Hero can't sleep. His sinuses keep swelling shut due to the allergies he has every summer.
An evil Mind Gremlin sneaks out the window, unseen by him, but the spell put upon him certainly worked.
Our Hero has been re-living the past. Certain, select days from the past, in a three-day block from 27 years ago. The way events unfolded in that memory, deep scars were dug, making them not easily forgotten.
The original events were difficult. Families, abuse, alcoholism, and anger. Lots of anger.
What the evil Mind Gremlin did was shine a bright light on that distant memory, highlighting it, calling it forth from the shadows, and forcing Our Hero to relive it over and over again. But this time, he began to fantasize about what he could have done differently. What he should have done differently.
It was the emotional equivalent to dumping a ton of gasoline-soaked straw on a dying fire.
Suddenly, Our Hero found himself in a battle inside his mind. Rage. He was consumed by rage as he thought about how he should have handled the situation. He should have thrown the man down on the ground and kicked the shit out of him. He should have beat him within an inch of his life. He should have beat down upon him the sum of all his resentments while accusing the man's mother of being responsible for all that was wrong at that moment.
Our Hero found himself in a battle with a ghost.
But this battle is pointless and stupid. He knows this. Or rather, he's supposed to know this. The spell put a fog on that knowledge. So after a few minutes of rage flowing around in his brainpan, he came up for air. He looked around his apartment and took a deep breath.
Then he focused on the moment in front of him. The present. The small actions of his fingers on the keyboard, the distant thunder of a storm that went around his village, the feel of the fan blowing in his hair.
So often, the solution to a problem is right in front of us. The present. What we're doing at that exact moment is far more powerful than any memory or dream or hope.
Our Hero doesn't own a time machine. He can't fix the past, re-do certain events, or fix the many mistakes he made. He can't foresee the future and he doesn't know the winning lottery numbers. But he can focus on the moment he is in, at that exact time, and he can do something about it.
It's 6:30am. Our Hero is still wide the fuck awake. His sinuses are still clogged and he can't breathe through his nose in order to sleep. But his head is quiet. The ghost is gone and he's left with the empty moments of his life, alone in his apartment, his fingers on the keyboard. It's the best he's got to work with right now and the best he can do.
He wonders, when his story gets re-told around the campfires, if this lesson will be included. Small victories in isolation in the middle of the night rarely are and it's a shame. They're usually the biggest victories of all.
No comments:
Post a Comment