Tag: reality

Reboot

Hearing unfamiliar banging and creaking sounds, he opened his eyes and found the ceiling.

Pink, and swaying. It felt like he was on a boat. Or would that be a ship?

He closed his eyes. Something was hung. Reboot. Try again.

When he next opened his eyes, he was looking at correctly colored sage green walls. Sunlight was streaming in.

Feeling better, he rose to hit the head and discovered a limp. He’d not had that before. As its presence was being digested, he passed the bathroom mirror.

He was female. Not bad looking, about the correct age, forty-five. Same colored hair. Those were starts to being the right person in the right reality.

More to digest.

He continued to the toilet. His cats and dogs must be out of the house. The primary reasons for keeping them was to help keep reality anchored. It didn’t work, if they weren’t around. Ergo, they weren’t around. That’s why his start-ups were hanging.

As he sat to piss, he considered going back to bed to reboot again, but it was already eight thirty. Time was the one constant that didn’t change when a start-up went awry.

Coffee, he decided, wiping, flushing, washing his hands and heading for the kitchen. He thought while popping a K-cup into place, coffee always helped release the hang ups. It was remarkable that way. Once he got the coffee into his system, he’d find the animals and bring them into the house. Then he’d decide. The house seemed correct, as did the reality outside his window. Maybe he’d enjoy being a woman for a day, or take a nap later and reboot.

Sipping the coffee, he smiled. Coffee always helped. If that ever changed, he didn’t know what he would do.

 

1

Five O’Clock Shadow

Feeling his Fitbit buzz, Thomas leaped up, hurrying out of the house as he checked the time and confirmed, yes, 4:59.

It was sunny, which was helpful. He ran out of the house to the sidewalk, scattering the snoozing cats on his porch into three directions. On the sidewalk, he stopped, panting fast and holding still. He checked his shadow. It was crisply defined on the white pavement. The other wasn’t there.

The Fitbit said it was still 4:59. It didn’t show seconds, which he lamented. Cars rumbled by, breezes tousled the trees’ leaves, and the cats crept out to see what he was doing.

Then, it must have been five, because the shadow was there. “Who are you?” Thomas said.

“Your shadow,” the shadow said. “One of many.”

“Many?”

“Yes. You’re the one true person. The rest, like me, are just shadow.” The voice and shadow were fading.

“Wait,” Thomas said, a ridiculous request because the shadow couldn’t wait. It was a five o’clock shadow. Why did it appear? What did it all meant?

He didn’t know. At this point, only his shadow knew for sure.

0

The Revelations Dream

Once again, dreams thundered in like tornadoes, leaving much to contemplate in their wake. The most prominent dream was about unknown talents and changes, in my mind.

  1. I could see things that others couldn’t see, including the future.
  2. While I was demonstrating this to a friend, I used a wrinkled, old Montgomery Ward Christmas catalog to show her.

Many people were present in my dream. Most were strangers, but friends and family were present. We seemed to be in a large room in the upper floors of a tall building. Windows were on the two outer walls. This vantage let us look out across a cityscape. Crisscrossing white cement roads connect business parks surrounded by manicured green spaces reminiscent of places that I worked at in San Mateo, Palo Alto, and Foster City, California.

Inside, we were looking at long gray counters located under the windows. Strolling along, we were looking at these. To me, they looked blank. I don’t know what others saw, but looking at the gray counters absorbed them. Seeing an orange button on the table, I pushed it. Silver metal boxes arose at regular intervals on the counters. They had controls on top. Feeling bold, I examined the controls of one. They seemed simple. Although I didn’t know what they did, I pushed one.

The light changed, revealing other objects around us. Turning to another box, I pressed another button and exposed another aspect of our hidden reality. My thought was, these machines help us see the world. I was excited and wanted to talk to others, but when I did, I discovered that they didn’t see the boxes or their influence.

Taking my mother by her shoulder, I pointed to where the boxes were. When I did that, the boxes became visible to her. Likewise, when I guided her to the two boxes that I’d used and pointed out their influence, she could now see them. Understanding that I seemed to be a connection, I went to others and showed them. Excited conversation spread as more and more people were engaged. I pressed more buttons. The lights shifted into something dark that revealed bright strips of existence and threads running from the people to the sky. I couldn’t see where the threads ended, but I thought that the strings went to stars.

My friend came in. A college professor who teaches network security and cyber-forensics, I told her what had happened. She was astonished. As I told her about this, I realized that since I’d been exposed to the machines’ influence, I could now see these things without the machines.

To prove that to her, I found an old Montgomery Ward Christmas catalog. Using it, I told her, I can see the future. Then I knew, it’s not the machines or the catalog, but using them encouraged me to see.

I was astounded. Even as understanding seeped into me and epiphanies bloomed, I grasped that if I touched some of the exposed objects, I could peel away more limitations. Touching the closest thread, which was connected to my friend, I saw her future flash into existence like a giant movie screen. Gazing up into it with amazement, she and I said, “Wow.”

The dream ended.

0

The Writing Adventure

I slipped into the groove today when I was writing. It’s a fun, satisfying, and rewarding place to be. Words fly and the story unfolds with that amazing sense that I’m transcribing what I’m watching. Finishing is a little sad because it was so enjoyable. I sit for a while, reading what I’ve written, thinking about it, and considering what I know comes next. I’m doing that to kill time because I wrote so fast, with such focus, that most of my coffee remains. I only wrote for about fifty minutes, but wrote fourteen pages, about three thousand words.

My fingers are tired. Looking around the coffee shop, I feel disconnected from this place  and uncertain if it’s real. These people and this place aren’t as dynamic as the characters and setting that I just left, but then, these folks are concerned about seeing plays, the weather, and what to eat. None of them seem intent on saving someone else. Maybe they’re hiding it well.

Good day of writing like crazy. Time to return to life’s mundanities.

2

A Dream So Real

Do you ever have a dream so real that you’re certain it happened?

I had one of these last night. My eyes were extremely bloodshot in the dream. Looking at my eyes in the mirror in the dream, I thought, wow, what the hell is going on? What caused my eyes to be so bloodshot?

But when I brushed my teeth and saw my eyes this morning, they weren’t bloodshot. I was damn sure that they would be, and shocked and amused when they weren’t. I wonder from that, what other things did I dream that I was certain was real?

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The Photograph

You ever see a photograph of yourself and scream in horror? “Oh my God, is that really how I look?”

In this case, the photo was on a website supporting a charity where I was a volunteer drone. It’s on the page where you order the tickets for this year’s event. I can imagine people seeing my photo and asking, “Alfred Hitchcock was there? I thought he was dead.”

Funny, but I never see myself like that in the mirror. Beauty is in the beholder’s eye, innit?

2

Distance Calling

The distance calls me

I try to see

who it is and what they want from me

the distance calls me

from outside

full of hate and telling me lies

the distance calls me

the people I know

urging me to love and telling me to grow

the distance calls me

without knowing why

I hide away and slip inside

0

The Reality

The sister got down on the floor on her back. She’d come down to help her younger sister with their mother’s care.

“I’m almost eighty years old,” she said. “I’m tired.”

It was expected. Her mother lived with her younger sister, who was seventy-two. One hundred one years old, Mom suffered from dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Other than that, and some minor injuries from falls, she was in great health, better health than her daughters.

It was a frustrating experience. The sisters loved their mother, and liked having her alive, but Mom often no longer remembered them. Mom would stand up and pee on the floor, and then cry over what she’d done. It wearied the sisters. After a lifetime of raising children (and now helping with grandchildren), divorces, bankruptcies, and health issues, they were ready to rest.

But rest wasn’t available, and that was the reality.

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