“I know I say it a lot, but if you want things to change you can’t just scream and whine about them changing. You cannot demand change, you have to be an upstanding example of why change should happen. You have to do your best to be the agent that inspires the changes. Yeah I know I’m harping on…
All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.
“You’re right. I don’t love you anymore.”
Her words clipped him right down to the soul. Even though he had said she must not have loved him with the was she was acting he couldn’t say he expected her to say it in such a way. He never expected her to say it was the end of things even if they both knew it was.
“Probably for the best then.” He muttered it quietly enough that he knew he sounded pathetic and weak. It would be a painful separation, as most tended to be, but it would make her happy wouldn’t it? The thought was comforting and ruining at the same time.
“I want you to find someone who is right for you so you can be happy,” She said plainly at first. She paused only a moment before asking him to leave, to which he obliged. After an uncomfortable parting she stared at the door for a while, wondering if he was going to come back.
“I wonder if you knew, when I said I wanted you to find someone else and be happy, that I was lying.”
“A wise man once told me that you must mind your manners if you ever want to grow strong and proud,” He told the children as they stared in utter wonder. Every day he told them stories, always ending with something like ‘a wise man once told me…’ Most of the little boys and girls didn’t realize they had just been taught a valuable lesson as they toddled off back towards their parents or the playsets scattered throughout the park.
The world was a dangerous place though and fewer parents wanted their children listening to an older man telling stories on the playground. Most mothers and fathers didn’t care to meet him or ask what it was he was actually teaching the kids. They just distrusted him and washed their hands of the matter. After a time one of the children, one who had sat through every story and must have been on the verge of becoming a teen, came up after the story was done with a very important question on his mind.
“My mother says it’s wrong to trust strangers, but I’ve never felt like you were a stranger. Should I really talk to you at all?”
With a kind smile and a glimmer in his all-knowing eyes, the man responded very evenly. “Your mother in very correct. It’s a hard world out there and not everyone can be trusted. I don’t expect any of you children to speak to me, nor do I want you to go doing every little thing I say. I want you to just listen. The value of listening is something you will probably never fully grasp, but try to remember how important it is.”
And then the man left without another word.
Many times the young boy thought about the man, but every time he went back to the park he couldn’t seem to find him. Soon the boy became a teen and the words of the man from the park rotated through his mind and even without thinking about it he found himself doing kinder things. Being a better person.
Visiting the old park more frequently, the stories became more vivid then when he first heard them told and he suddenly understood why it was the man had started telling the stories in the first place. There was much that children couldn’t seem to learn from their parents no matter how they loved them. No one had ever actually questioned the man after he was done with a story before, so the boy could only assume he knew his work was done once a child actually had the nerve to ask about things.
That was how long the boy would tell the stories too.
“A wise man once told me…”
He was always a very good child. Though he was not very outgoing he was always so intelligent and caring, being the best friend he could to the few people that were willing to tolerate his shyness. The family moved a lot though and the few friends he managed to make were quite often left behind, meaning that he had to start anew. Somehow he always managed though, even if it was hard and he was a touch too emotional.
Teachers adored him as he grew older. He was very intelligent, scoring well on tests while writing lovely pieces of prose for exams, and it showed in everything he did. He was loyal, unyielding and devoted to those for whom he cared. But he was still shy and somehow people hated him in high school. At the prom he had no date and was drenched in punch by a group of particularly nasty girls, all claiming to have been hurt by him. Rumors spread like wildfire, yet he still managed to get through.
Then college came. He was happy with what he was learning and did alright with his first term. Something about the material felt so alluring, to which he could only assume it was because he had picked to study such a thing. Second term went alright until he failed a class. He had always been so smart before though, above average, and couldn’t understand how he failed. Still he tried to keep determined, signing up for classes he thought he could do better in next term. Though he tried his best he was forced to drop out of the term early, having been informed a week in that he would no longer have funding thanks to failing a class the term before.
Guilt threatened to overwhelm the once immaculate student, but he swore he would do better once he could raise the money to get back in to school. Focusing on education his entire life he had never had time for a proper job. No one would hire a nineteen year old boy with no experience. He no longer had even one wayward friend. He had never felt so alone before or so defeated.
“I am a good person,” He said to himself, dejected. “I try my best. I haven’t broken any rules. I am a good person.” The voice sounded more empty the more he tried to force the words out. Sitting alone in his home he couldn’t help but think about the only thing his mother could ever say about his situation.
“Get angry.”
The mantra she spouted always pissed him off, but not at what she wanted him to be angry about. No one seemed to notice him floundering. No one seemed to care he was such a good person. No one could understand the overwhelming burden of guilt and uselessness he felt every single day.
And all he wanted was to matter.
Easy reading is damn hard writing.
She couldn’t recall how long she had been staring at her typewriter when she finally decided she needed to break for lunch. Despite her honest efforts she couldn’t seem to write so much as a single sentence and she didn’t have the foggiest idea why. Hunger nagging, she couldn’t tear her mind away from the stories begging to be written while she prepared lunch.
Even just sitting at her dining room table, listening to the soft pleasant noises of her home and the neighborhood, she still felt something was amiss. If anything she knew she should have been busting with inspirations, because she did live in a nice home with a scenic view and what could have been more inspiring than that? That wasn’t even mentioning the copious amounts of time that she had just to devote to her work.
Still that typewriter hadn’t really been put to use in days. Whenever she fell into a rut like this one she always wondered what would bring her out of it. Somehow she couldn’t ever recall what fixed the last dry spell whenever it happened either. Before she even noticed she had cleaned her plate and resumed her blank staring about her home. The quiet was suddenly all too quiet for her, so on her way back to her study she flipped on her stereo to something that always seemed to ease her mind.
Then she was there again. Staring down that old fashioned typewriter as if it would crack under pressure and just start writing like the world were about to end. The typewriter did not cave however, no matter how much she stared expectantly at it. She closed her eyes and listened to her music as calmly as she could, trying not to let her entire lack of progress get to her.
In what felt like a daydream she felt the music wash over her in waves. The steady tides eased her mind and began to draw pictures in her mind. Before she knew it she was utterly relaxed and filled to the brim with creative energy. Opening her eyes she almost expected the typewriter to look just as menacing as it had before.
It stared in a neutral way, almost as if to ask if she was ready yet. A soft chuckle later she was typing away happily. Though she knew what she was doing wouldn’t be perfect, probably wouldn’t catch the eye of anyone, it still felt almost addicting to put the words down. Perhaps someday someone could understand and appreciate it, but if they didn’t then at least she still had it.
At least she had done it.
So many times she was positive that she was a good person. She helped everyone she could and always tried to stay positive. She got good grades in school and even though she was shy she really wanted to make friends. She graduated and went straight into thoughts about college and what she could do with her life.
Then things began to fall apart. She couldn’t afford school, she had no job opportunities, and her horrible self-esteem problems threatened to overwhelm her. Still somehow she tried as hard as she could. So many harsh things were said to and about her. The worst wasn’t even I hate you, it was I love you.
A whirlwind romance was the last thing she expected in her deepest pits of despair. She warned him. There was so much about her she hated, so much she needed to work on, yet still she somehow ended up with him. He said so many times he would do anything for her.
But the day she died she had only one thing on her mind. Only one thing on her lips. “I warned you darling.”
Sometimes he swore he remembered the memory perfectly without a single flaw. It usually took a few moments, a disconnected squint, and a long hum noise till he realized he didn’t actually have the image in it’s entirety. A few minutes later he’d remember how much it pissed him off and then the little miniature hate spiral began again. Usually it only happened after he woke up from the dream, feeling somewhat like he could recall it while knowing he couldn’t at all.
Dreams were like that though. Usually people didn’t let it bother them when they couldn’t really hold onto a dream after they woke up, and he never did before either. This dream was specific though. He remembered having it just as spring started one year and he remembered why it stuck in his mind so persistently. That year, though Spring was approaching, he dreamed so vividly about a winter day.
Spring was often a brilliant escape from the doom and gloom of winter, for as the flowers bloomed the mind seemed to brighten from the dark winter clouds. In his mind it was as if he was leaving something behind though, which was the main feeling he woke with. It had been a year since he had the dream initially and he still couldn’t remember it fully.
The most burdening part of it all remained that he felt like there was something very important he was leaving behind. He wan’t sure if he left it behind physically, metaphorically, or when it happened but he knew it must have been something. Seasons changed, but Winter still captivated him and he felt nothing but dream when Spring would roll around again. It was as if each time those seasons changed he was losing the mystery something all over again.
That was why he hated what day it was. Midnight marked the first day of spring and he lay awake in bed with a cold sweat overwhelming him. Was there something important he’d lose today? The question kept swimming about his head until he was about ready to explode. Distractions were all he could hope for, so he wandered his house to make sure everything was in order. He did this many times, until he could convince himself he had something to do no longer.
On the way back to bed he caught a glimmer from outside of the window though, and the momentary distraction was welcomed. Curiosity would have urged him to the window anyway, even if he wasn’t looking for reasons not to have to go back to bed. What he saw just outside was rather unexpected though and it didn’t click into place as soon as it should have.
Outside it was snowing.
The wintry slush made him feel almost as if seasons didn’t really exist. That man defined calendar event had him so utterly stressed that he had lost sleep. Had lost his temper.
Then someone bounded outside from their home. It didn’t take long for her to play in the snow and he began to realize what he was missing.
Photo Credit: http://valyeszter.deviantart.com/art/winter-memorie-115389206?q=boost%3Apopular%20in%3Aphotography&qo=726
His heart kept speeding up just as he felt like he could possibly drift of into sleep. It was infuriating feeling the cusp of the dream world slip away every time his heart decided to give him a swift kick. Mostly he wanted to blame it on the hard day he’d had, but there were other reasons too. Reasons he didn’t much care to delve into, meaning his heart would continue to ache and beat like he was dying.
Work was hard, but everything outside of work seemed even harder to him. Family was closing in too, like they all thought that if they nagged him enough he might just quit his job and become a rocket scientist. Well no, not that exactly. They just wanted him to stop working in a dead-end clinic to be a ‘real’ doctor again.
He wasn’t even sure what that meant. Sure, the clinic couldn’t really pay well and his hours were sometimes a bit of a burden, but he didn’t mind. There was always the pride that he was actually helping people who really needed it behind everything he did. Except now he was tired without the ability to sleep and his family was constantly burning at the back of his brain.
Was it really all that foolish to give up security for the possibility of actually feeling good about what you did? He didn’t want to think it was, but most people would say yes. Especially his mother. It didn’t really matter how old you got to mothers. They always had a way of making you feel like you were way back in first grade all over again. That’s how he felt.
It was like being lost in a fog and the lighthouse that’s supposed to be guiding you out suddenly seemed to be coming from thousands of different directions. His heart beat in his chest again as he thought about what he could possibly do. He didn’t want to think about how, even though he had found a balance in his life, everyone else was so good about disturbing his peace. Just a simple peace found in doing something he enjoyed.
Was that really so bad?
