A million imagined sorrows

The radiant sun sears my soul. The rain, much awaited, feels like a thousand needles. The leathery ocean swirls about me, its inertia, sluggish and contagious. The flowers have faded away unnoticed, a few await their turn, languid and sighing. There is refusal in the sway of the trees, heartless deception in every passing cloud. The maiden night is blue and starry. She stops short at my window, for sobs and shivers diligently stand guard.

My mind swells with questions. I pretend not to know the answers, for they will seek and stab every buried hope. Every minute brings a different conclusion, linchpin after excruciating linchpin, keepsakes from life's countless lessons. Everywhere I turn, a limitless blank wall looms up. Anger bounces back. Sadness echoes its sonorous silence. Darkness seeps down as the menacing walls close in.

This agony I've invented, it imposes on me the weight of a million years. I have to stop. I can say no more.

An escapist route

Just for a day, I became a child again. Mickey and Donald, Aladdin and Alice, Simba and Mogli, all pranced around me. I danced with them, in an innocent attempt to bring back those fairy tale days.

I was walking on the road, my palm safely locked in my father's. We were going to the bookstore to buy my book for the month. There was so much anticipation, long moments of deliberation, as I struggled to make the difficult choice between Rapunzel and Peter Pan. But I asked only for one book every month, no more.

I walked alone for miles on end, playing the wide eyed traveler, giving in to truant whims and wayward thoughts. I reveled in the cat calls that came my way. I pleasured in those envious glances as I slurped my ice cream as if it was the only thing I lived for. Words, in tongues both familiar and novel, hung around in an unintelligible buzz. Smiles from strangers flashed on and off in my head.

I've always lived in a fantasy land, my own dear creation. I mostly lurk in folds of an improbable imagination. For the world outside is really gray in comparison.

I sat at the very top of the Ferris Wheel, Sun Wheel, they called this one. I sat drenched in the midday sun, the cool air, such a welcome soporific. The cage I sat in swung back and forth as it gently descended to the shimmering water a hundred feet below.

January! Carnival time again. I hopped from one colorful store to the next, my fingers sticky with cotton candy and lips chapped from salty popcorn. I rode the Ferris Wheel, Giant Wheel, we called it, three times in a row. I loved the slight tug in my stomach each time I zipped down to the ground. I savored the feeling of power when I paused at what seemed like the top of the world. When I get out I will stand in the line one more time.

I walked in that world of animals that sing and birds that talk. I cut across pictures being shot, soon to be hung up on familiar walls, souvenirs offering timelessness. I searched for a souvenir to record these memories. No wall can hold them. For these thoughts are too fluid, part of a continuum, heavy with drama. How do I frame such enormity, such flux?

It is my birthday, an uneventful listless day so far. I walk into my house to the collective cheer of every person I considered friend. A cake waited with glowing candles. They handed me a scrapbook. Every page was handmade by my friends, crafted with such care. They somehow magically framed the enormity. That moment of surprise and gratitude, I will remember forever. I swept the room with my eyes, all I could say was a silent thank you.

It was another day straight out of the fairy tales I still hold on to. They agreed with me, Lilo and Stitch, Belle and Beast, that perfect endings were true indeed. They even dazzled me with a promise of my own sweet ending -happily ever after.What must it feel like to be Cinderella, kissing her prince on her special night? What must it feel like, such hard earned freedom, such unexpected love! Such thrill is but imagined. It is the solitude that is real.

I tire myself, more often than I should. The fatigue can be unbearable. The grief can be morbid. I've always wondered about the reason behind this extreme turbulence. I always emerge confused whether it is the cause or the effect. I would wrap this life and gift it away. Alas! It takes a brave martyr to be my rudder...