Month: October 2015

What’s Friday Freewrite? Find out here.

Bound by rules I don’t entirely believe¹, I wander through the desert in search of answers, a pursuit that surely has no resolution, no termination except in death. Loneliness is my companion. Uncertainty my consolation. I observe the lives of the others, the carefree jubilation of the ordinary things that are a part of everyday life, and I stand outside on the periphery, too turned away from the ways of the world to participate, too doubtful of my order’s doctrine to remain with them. I wander the vast yet narrow no-man’s land of the intersection between, broken, lost and alone.

It seems to me that all of this must mean something². Surely, this is more than just random chance. I feel so lost, adrift in a dark sea of uncertainty, ruderless³ and without a paddle.

This all feels so superficial, so empty, like a cheap plastic coating. Does this plastic coating hide behind it mysteries worth exploring, or is the plastic all there is, all there ever was?

Sometimes, I feel that if I only squint hard enough, if I only focus a little further, a little deeper than usual, I might glimpse something from between the cracks. Perhaps the thin plastic of ordinary life contains cracks. Perhaps it’s worn and frayed and peeling at the edges. If I only focus had enough, just maybe I’ll see something. If I do, I hope it will be something worth seeing.

I wander through the desert, traverse sprawling dunes, trudge through blinding choking storms of sand, searching through perpetual night, searching for a light, a beacon, some guidepost to light my way and help me find my way home.

Truth eludes me, taunts me from a distance, promising I can find it if only I search dilligently⁴ enough. Yet it hides from me, flees whenever I feel it might be coming close.

“Just a little closer,” it mocks. “You almost had me.” Then it’s gone.

I’ve wandered through the dark for so long that I fear I’ve gone blind. In the absence of light, I ask myself if I will ever see again, and I find I have no answer.

Footnotes

1. I wrote this psuedo-fictional account of a man on the outside at a time when I was experiencing a lot of doubt about the things I myself believe. I still have those same doubts, and don’t see myself resolving them anytime soon, but I’m doing my best to live my life in spite of them.

2. I firmly believe this, but sometimes my faith is tested.

3. Should be spelled rudderless.

4. Should be spelled diligently.

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What’s Friday Freewrite? Find out here.

He’d left his old life behind¹. Old habits, old places, old faces. He’d moved on, gone to somewhere far away, never to return again.

But even though he’d moved on, ghosts from his past would still visit him, haunting, asking him why he’d given them up for something new.

He’d reasoned with them, told them that nothing lasts forever, that to stagnate is to die. They’d left him, sad and doleful, but would come from time to time, hoping he’d finally return to them.

Young people are always arrogant². They don’t mean to be. They just don’t have enough life experience to know how to live any other way.

Everything is in motion. Even when you choose to stand still, you’re hurtling through space and time. You can accept this and be happy, or you can dig your heels in and be miserable. Either way, death comes to us all³.

Footnotes

1. My life has passed through many phases. I’ve found that who I was in the past is constantly dying so that my future self might find new life. It’s the constant tug of war between the two, the loss of the past and the uncertainty of the future, that fuels much of my writing.

2. No offense to the young 🙂 When I speak of youth, I speak only of personal experience.

3. I think about death a lot. It haunts me.

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©2015 Jeff Coleman. All rights reserved. For reproduction rights, please contact the author (who happens to be a kind and eminently reasonable man.) Unless otherwise stated, images are copyrighted by various artists and licensed by Shutterstock.