So, for whatever reason, I will meet this black-haired girl at some point in the future. Some will read that and think “Oh, that must be nice, thinking you know the future.” They think the experience of knowing the future is like sneaking a peek ahead in a book… assuming they’re not hopelessly deluded. But, if I am correct, it is an experience you simply cannot just outright imagine. If knowing the future is like looking further on into a book, then the pages are under your feet. To turn them is to invite perpetual motion. To turn them is to realize that time is self-committed. And nobody actually wants to think that through
We think of the present self as “me”. This is not true. You are always you, time is just a necessary sorting creature, who helps you come to grips with who you are in digestible chunks. Father Time is a kindly shepherd, helping you get as much of the full picture as you can stand.
Few things are as painful as leaving the good Father.
For, you see, gravity still exists in the spiritual realm. And you have jumped off the cliff.
It is a long. Long. Long. Way down.
You hurtle through utter chaos. This isn’t half as cute as it sounds. Time gives you space to sort everything safely. Now you don’t have that. That’s when you realize that chaos is an ocean, and what you thought was you is a thimble, and nobody is there to pull you out as you sink.
And boy, do you.
It doesn’t take long to realize that I lied about falling. Saying gravity exists is simply modern cope. Silly modern, there is only relationship! And relationship has a funny habit of stripping your ego away, of forcing you to let go of all the petty things you thought you were. But if this is relationship… who am I relating to, in all this chaos?
Look down.
Someone’s down there. It’s so infinitely large it’s hard to comprehend, but it’s there. In the bright darkness. Looking at you.
And suddenly you understand why none of your thoughts are linear: one second you are two the next eighty-two. You look around and it all seems familiar, in the way a chair looks familiar if you’re looking at it in a funhouse mirror.
Down below, you open your eyes. And you find yourself smiling at you, even as you are drawn towards you.
And it is entirely too much. What we are is entirely different than what we can handle. Self is not an idea of yourself, but something so much greater that attempting to describe it is necessary deception.
And all that’s nice. But.
You still have to get up in the morning.
You still have a wife and children who need you to go to work and focus on all the incoming calls. You still have a PTSD-riddled body which makes thinking actively laborious. So you reach out, into the void… and the exact right thing just… comes. Right then and there. The thought doesn’t seem to come right now. But, I mean, who cares? It worked! Who cares why? Or how? The fact that wisdom that I didn’t know I had (because I don’t, not right now) just came out of my mouth is irrelevant, because I helped. Doesn’t stop me from wondering, however.
But the exact mechanics of what happened aren’t made clear until my wife walks into the room. There’s a moment where it all comes out jumbled at her. How could it not? Everything is excited to see her. Touch her. To feel her soul, pulsing in my hands.
And suddenly, I am one again. Young and old. All is together. Loving her. It’s grown better with Father Time. Somehow I do understand her better. There is some form of progression in life, and it’s the most wonderful surprise I could imagine.
So there is this moment, sometime in the future, where the black-haired girl and I will meet. I know this because I remember it as happening… however long… from “now”. A truly reverse memory. A memory that forces me to confront the self-deception I thought was identity.
Why is this person in this reverse memory? It’s a lot to take in. I keep trying to understand why. And that’s natural. The mind has to wonder about such things, on some level. Mine doesn't shut up all that well, and it creates loops where I wonder why I am falling towards this moment in time. It's not exactly a comfortable experience, and wanting to know why she's involved is natural. And yes, I know that it only stops when the moment happens. So, it's extremely natural to want to know how to end such a deeply uncomfortable experience.
It is also natural that I wonder about this person. Is she okay? Why has shown she up so prominently in my dreams? Why am I hurtling through chaos on account of this? Is there something I am missing?
But I have no power over this. I cannot contact her. It isn’t possible, and that’s that. Painful as it is to admit, I have no ability to change what is happening to me for the moment. Kindness, right here and in the next moment, is the only way I win. Kindness always wins. Always. It’s not perfect, but it will do as a way to hold the course. Even if this never ends, I know that it is better to die wondering what happened to her than try and obsess. That may sound extreme… but read the above again and try to grasp what I am saying here.
And besides, there is one more place I can find refuge: in the Now. And there is one way I have found that I can reliably get into the Now.
It starts the moment my wife wraps her arms around me. One infinity presses against another.
And in that timeless time Maria does more than Father Time ever could.
A Half-Hearted Attempt at a Conclusion
There are a few people who will wonder why I went out of my way to write four blog posts about a series of dreams that's really nobody's business but my own. There may be one person particularly who stumbles upon this, who will probably have a ton of questions, the bigggest one what the solitary fuck made me think I should put this up.
Let me clarify.
This blog exists because if I have to write it.
I don't have a plan. Every time I try to make a plan for this blog, I can't keep to it. I sit down, and whatever comes up, I write. That's how this works. And, for the last two years, every time I have sat down to write on this blog, the stories in these four posts have come up. Over. And over. And over. And for two years I have resisted the urge to write these four posts. It drained my ability to write here, and I need to write here. It's something that must be done, for whatever reason.
If these posts helped you, great. If they hurt you, I apologize. If they shocked you... well... how do I think I feel, writing them?
But the blog most go on. So the posts are up. I invite questions, comments, concerns, etc, but understand that this is the most restrained and ethical way I could think to write about this extremely private and weird issue of mine.
I do believe the black-haired girl is a real person, living in the world, right now. I hope if she finds these, she will see that I have attempted to the best of my ability to keep certain things private. There are many things I could have said, that I did not. Will not. I have attempted to just keep to my side of the story. I know a good deal more than I let on, even here. This is the bare minimum I could write and continue the blog.
Anything more than that is just emotive posturing. So we cut it here. Onwards!
An Additional Note
My wife and I purchased this fine volume
As I began to read it, a good many things clicked into place for me. The first few pages of this book clarified a hole in my philosophy of life, and thus everything I have ever touched. Including this blog post. Rather than smooth it out, I have elected to keep the messiness here, so that my evolution can be tracked for what it is. Expect some additional posts inspired by this book sooner or later.
The thing that is relevant to this post and all four posts in the Elephant series, is this: a Christian is supposed to see the world not just in terms of symbols, but types: people who resemble a chief archetype (don’t think the repetition an accident).
What I see in this eternal free-fall is merely the archetype of what falls. And, for whatever reason, I have been allowed a glimpse at what I already am… for I am being pulled to me.
We all are like this.
But if I did not see the process, in all its achingly beautiful glory, I wouldn’t have the strength to go on. I must know what I am in the orbit of. Explicitly.
And that, my friends, is all that prophecy is: revealing to broken souls they still have a chance. And I am that, very much so do.
The Warmth
Yes, this is written mere hours before this post publishes. Extrapolate what may happen past that, and let the reader be discerning. The biggest thing that tripped me up about the vision is that it is a total bodily experience. I experienced the event as my future self. The body that is mine in the future feels so different that it’s almost traumatic, just on its own. My body then is so much lighter! Warmer! I don’t recognize me!
The prayer came, but this time for the black-haired girl. And a warmth came through me, out of me chest, culminating into my fingers. I was full of warmth. I was light. I was free.
It was the same light and warmth I felt in my body as my baseline, when I meet the black-haired girl in the future. It’s not constant now like it is then.
But there is a new beginning. Right now. The morning before I publish this. All the things in creation are for our good, even silly blog posts like mine!
Understand that, five minutes after this is published, things will be different. And you will not know. If you stick around and read the blog, welcome! If you don’t, hopefully some bit of this helped. I continue on, regardless, towards that fixed anchor I know for my own good. Onward!
