Creative Ramblings

An old one and a new one

2009-11-24T14:29:00.000-08:00

Two poems - one written when I was 19, the other written today at age 28. Which is which? I can't really tell a difference. I don't think that's a good sign.

In a vexed and daunted drama, we played the part of fools
who screamed aloud an endless string of nothingness
born of the pretended passion we thought we possessed.
Deluded-
we could not understand the true intent
of God’s offering to children here forgotten
and while following a winding path shaped toward satisfaction,
we tried.
Cried aloud our heart’s desire! Born of artful apetite,
a spark of fire
intense as the sun, and then
void.
And how even then from our phantasmic path we strayed
And we (like Caesar, who supposed he had the world) are betrayed.

We are cruel, clumsy creatures
Running in circles and
Running in circles and
Running into each other.
Tracing obscure angles into the earth,

We glow with desperation and despair.
Our frustration is blinding.

We are a savage, sightless species.
All of us hurting and
All of us hurting and
All of us hungry and
There is not enough.

The Little Boy Who Wandered

2009-11-02T13:10:00.001-08:00

Once upon a time there was a little boy who loved to wander. He would wander over the hills beyond the edge of the town, past the fields where the farmers were sweating under the sun, right to the edge of the mysterious forest. The little boy loved the sight of the forest, so green and dark. There were many adventures in there, the boy thought. There was magic and love and glory. He would walk along its edges, enjoying the forest smells, but he never would enter. That was forbidden. Oh, once or twice he took a few steps beyond the line of trees, into the outer edges of the dark wood, before running breathlessly back into the open air, giddy with excitement. But he could never go in properly and explore.

“That is not where you belong,” his mother said one day. “The wood is dangerous. No more wandering. One day soon you’ll be a man, and then you will work in the fields where you will sweat under the sun, like your father and his father before him. And then you will marry, and have a little boy of your own. This is the proper course of life.”

And so the little boy who loved to wander tried not to wander any more. He learned to work in the fields and to sweat under the sun. At first it was very difficult not to stare at the hills beyond the edge of town, and to stop from thinking of what lay beyond, but with time it grew easier.

The little boy got bigger and bigger, and the people of the town began to treat him like a man. But the little boy knew he was still a little boy.

One day, when he was working in the fields and sweating under the sun, the little boy looked at the farmers all around him. Their eyes were empty and sad, and little weary lines marked their brown faces.

“I won’t become like that!” the little boy said to himself, “I’m meant for something more!”

And he threw down his hoe, wiped the sweat from his brow, and wandered away. He wandered over the hills beyond the edge of the town right to the edge of the mysterious forest. Here he hesitated, and his lip trembled with fear.

“Are you going into the wood?” asked a strange voice.

The boy turned and saw a little glowing creature, floating nearby. It looked like a very small woman with wings, and she smiled at the boy and flew happily around his head.

“If you’re going into the wood, you’ll need help,” she said, “I know all the ways of the forest: how to climb over branches, and how to search for the delicious mushrooms, and how to hide from the creatures that would eat you.”

The boy didn’t like the sound of being eaten at all. “I don’t know,” he said, “Is it worth it?”

“Of course!” the little fairy replied, “Life in the forest is magic and wonderful! The cares of the men of your little town won’t ever find you in there, because you are different and you are special.”

“Yes, I am special,” the little boy thought, “No more sweating under the sun for me!”

And so the fairy led the little boy into the wood. She taught him how to climb over branches, and how to search for the delicious mushrooms to eat, and how to hide from the evil creatures that would eat him. And it was scary, but it was exciting, and so very different from life in the little town beyond the hills. The little boy thought of his mother and father, and of their eyes that were empty and sad and of the weary lines that marked their brown faces. And he felt sorry for them sometimes, but there was much to do in the mysterious wood and the boy stayed very busy.

Of course, sometimes he grew discouraged. The mushrooms were difficult to find at times, the branches large and daunting, and the creatures came more and more often. But the little fairy was always there to encourage the little boy.

“You are different,” she said time and time again, “You are special.”

And the little boy believed her and would carry on cheerfully, humming a little tune to himself.

One day the boy met another little boy who was also searching for mushrooms. Then he met another, and a little girl too. There were many little children in the forest looking for mushrooms and places to hide.

“Where did they all come from?” the little boy asked the fairy.

“Why, from the towns and the fields, just like you!” she replied.

“But I thought I was different and special,” he said.

“You are,” she said, smiling, “But so are they. Each and every one of them.”

And then the day came that the fairy told the little boy she couldn’t help him anymore. He knew all the tricks of the forest and he could take care of himself. She had other little boys and girls to help, she said. Other children who were wandering into the wood who would need her help. But she would always remember him, and maybe they would meet again one day. And so she left.

“I don’t need her anymore,” the little boy told himself, “I know how to survive in the forest.”

But there many children now in the wood, and there were not enough mushrooms, and there were not enough places to hide. Many of the little boys and girls got lost, or went hungry, or were eaten by the creatures that roam the night. The little boy worked hard. He fought for the mushrooms all during the day. He chased other little boys away from the places to hide during the night. He survived.

It was hard, but it was worth it – for he was now living in the magic forest. He was different from the people in the town, different from the farmers who worked in the fields and sweated under the sun. He was special.

His fingers turned brown from digging into the forest soil for mushrooms. He became skinny and small enough to hide almost anywhere. His eyes grew empty and sad, and little weary lines marked his brown face.

An Existential Encounter

2006-02-24T08:22:00.000-08:00

A 1-page play for my infamous writing group.

Lights up. The stage is bare, but for two simple chairs facing downstairs. Seated on these chairs are two men in black, casual clothes, staring straight ahead. There is a long period of silence. When they speak, they do not look at each other.

Man 1: Are you real?

Man 2: (considers) I... think so. Why do you ask?

Man 1: I'm considering the possibility that nothing outside my own consciousness is verifiably real.

Man 2: Of course you are.

Man 1: Descartes said that everything can be doubted, can be thought away, except one's own consciousness.

Man 2: Day-who?

Man 1: My mind, therefore, is the only thing that I can be confident is truly real. And that made me wonder if you are real.

Man 2: I feel real.

Man 1: But what if you are not? What if you are only part of a world that I invented but that does not truly exist outside of myself, an illusion I created to keep me company out of some sense of cosmic loneliness?

Man 2: Would it make a difference?

Man 1: I think it would, but I'm not sure how.

Pause.

Man 2: You think too much.

Man 1: (growing emotional) I just want to know! I just wish everything wasn't so vague, so uncertain, so full of different and opposing meanings. Don't you ever wish you could cling to something and know, without any doubt, that it was true? Don't you wish there were some dry ground in this epistimological nightmare we call reality? Love, desire, pain, hunger, death: there's too many symbols! Too many illusions! Too much interpretation! Don't you ever want something more.... stable?

Man 2: What does what it matter what I want? I may not even be real.

Pause.

Man 1: Don't leave me, ok?

Man 2: (looks at him and smiles) Ok.

Another Short Story

2005-12-14T09:49:00.000-08:00

Here's another first draft for my writing group, which I'm finally getting back together with after a long hiatus. The assignment was to in some way reference or connect to the author Lewis Carroll.

I hate parties, mostly. I don't care to drink, which seems to be one of the two main items of business at these things; and I'm not interested in going home with any ladies tonight, which is the other. And yet, for some insane reason, I'm here. Sitting uncomfortably on a stained couch, surrounded by pompous frat boys and their brainless bimbos. There's nothing like a large group of stupid people to make me feel unsocial and hostile. It doesn't help that the stereo in the corner is hurting my ears and shaking the walls. I've noticed that bad music is usually played very loudly, as if the decibels might make up for the poor quality. I prefer my music with more than three chords, thank you.

I can just see Lewis from here. He's in the kitchen, surrounded by people all talking and laughing. A girl with red hair whispers in his ear and he grins goofily. God, I hate him. I should just go.
A blonde bounces up to me with a drink in hand (not her first if her breath is any indication) and bats her eyes ridiculously. She's hardly wearing a thing; its a wonder she doesn't explode out of her dress at the slightest movement. I expected this. You hear how cliquish people are at college parties, but its not all true. You can't sit by yourself for long before somebody feels like they have to come over and make you feel included. I could be making idiot jokes and drinking myself into a mindless stupor if I wanted, but I'm not because I choose not to - and yet some tender hearted girl always feels only she can make you have fun. If only these people could see themselves they'd realize how utterly wretched they are. I've found that refusing to make eye contact and speaking in monosyllabics usually ends these encounters relatively painlessly.

“HI,” she has to shout to be heard. For a supposed “social function,” the music sure does a fine job of making normal conversation impossible. “HI! I'M KANDI!”

“Hello,” I say, studying the carpet.

“I HAVEN'T SEEN YOU AROUND BEFORE! HERE WITH SOMEBODY?”

I nod. That's an butt-ugly painting on the wall.

“WHO?”

I point into the kitchen, but there's about a million people in there. “Lewis,” I mouth.

“WHO? OH, LEWIS! I LOVE HIM, HE'S GREAT! SO FUNNY!”

I nod and smile weakly. I think I'm going to be sick.

“DON'T YOU WANT A DRINK?” she points at her full cup.

Shrug. Please, please go away.

“WANT ME TO GET YOU ONE? WAIT RIGHT HERE.”

And she's gone, leaving me a chance to escape. I have to get out of this crowd, away from the music, from everything. I should just leave, but instead I wander into a hallway looking for a bathroom and soon find it. The line of drunks waiting to take a leak and/or throw up gives it away. There's too many people, and this small hallway makes it worse. I feel like I can't breathe, and I don't think I can force my way back through the crowd to the front door, so I open one of the doors in the hallway and throw myself inside. It's relatively dark and quiet inside and I take deep breaths, calming myself.

I think I'm in a bedroom, and for a moment I worry that I may have interrupted some kind of clandestine make-out session, but a quick glance around the room confirms that I'm fortunately alone. I sit on the end of the bed and put my head in my hands. I was an idiot to come here, I knew I'd hate it. I don't like parties, its not in my nature; you can't just change who you are because somebody asks you to. Its not like I owe him any favors anyway. I was crazy to come; I should just leave. I stand up to go and catch sight of somebody moving out of the corner of my eye.

I jump back, startled and suddenly full of adrenaline. My hands are shaking, but its just a large mirror. I hadn't noticed it before, and so my own reflection had scared me. How ironic. Its pretty dark in here, though the light of the moon and various car headlights filters through the drapes, and I have to get quite close to the smooth surface of the mirror to see my face clearly. Messy, unkept hair, weak stubble on a weak chin, dull, stupid looking eyes and a crooked nose. That's me, alright. Sometimes I wish I could reach through the surface of the mirror, like that story, and strangle the kid on the other side. He mocks me. He's always there.

“Go away,” I whisper. It's my custom to say something similar whenever presented with my own image. It has never obeyed.

It's time to go. If I wasn't in the mood for this before, I'm certainly not now. Screw Lewis, let him find his own way home. He hasn't said one word to me since we got here, anyway. He'll never know I'm gone.

I step out into the hallway, and into Lewis. Classic.

“Hey, buddy,” he says, weaving a little, “I've been looking all over for you!”

Right. I saw how hard he was looking. Guess he thought I'd turned into a big-bosomed blonde.

“I'm leaving, see ya later.”

“Whoa, wait, you can't go! The fun's just starting!”

“Lewis,” I lower my voice so the drunks in line for the bathroom don't hear us, “I told you that if I didn't like it I'd leave, and I'm leaving.”

“Didn't you have a drink?”

“I don't want a drink, Lewis. I want to go home.”

“Hold on, man, just hold on. You're my ride! I'd leave with you now too, only there's this girl-”

Classic Lewis. There's always a girl; a girl who's not like the other girls.

“I tell you, Carl, she's not like the other girls. She's something special, ya know?”

Whatever.

“Her name's Alice, she's around here somewhere. I want to introduce her to you, hold on. Don't go anywhere, ok? Come on, buddy....who's my buddy? Who's my buddy...?.”

I nod reluctantly. How does he do that? He can talk me into anything. I'm just a tool in his kit, and he loves me only when he needs me. I should just leave.

“Great, I'll be right back, wait here.”

What a miserable night. I press myself against the wall to allow people to pass back and forth in the hallway without having to stumble over me, and pray that Lewis will be quick. I should know better. Several minutes go by and there's not a sign of him. I'm about to give up and leave anyway when a girl bumps into me, spilling a bit of her drink on my shirt.

“Oh, I'm sorry,” she says pathetically. She brushes her long red hair out of her eyes, looking for a kleenex in her purse. “I didn't see you there.”

“Yeah, its ok. Don't worry about it.” She's still digging in her purse, and she looks for a moment like she's going to fall over. She's had a lot to drink.

“I just wasn't looking where I was going,” She babbles as she wipes at my shirt with a wrinkled receipt, “I was just looking for Lewis and I didn't know....”

“Lewis?" I take a guess. "You Alice?”

“Yeah,” she looks at me, puzzled, “how'd you know?”

“I'm Lewis's roommate. Carl.”

“Carl? Who?” Her nose scrunches up as she thinks. It's obviously a laborious task in her current state. “Oh, wait, Carl! You're his roommate, right?” Yeah, I just said that. “Yeah, I think he mentioned you were, you know.... here.” She laughes, much too loud and too long, an awakward laugh. “Nice to meet you. Where is he?”

She stares at me inquistively, yet not quite all there. Her eyes seem big and round and innocent, though I have no doubt that in many ways she knows more of life than I do. She trusts me, somehow, because of my tenuous connection to Lewis, because she's drunk and can't think clearly, because maybe she's just that kind of a person. Suddenly, an impulse seizes me. Before I know what I'm doing, I'm pointing to the door I just came out of, nodding my head in that direction. She stumbles to it, nearly crashing into the wall before entering the darkened bedroom. I follow her. I must be crazy, but I feel like I'm not even here. What does that mean? It's like... like I'm watching myself in a movie and have no control over the plot.

She collapses on the bed and looks around languidly.

“So where is he?”

“He, uh... he said he'd meet us here in a few minutes.” I'm such a bad liar, but fortunately she's too drunk to notice.

“He better hurry, I'm not going to wait forever...”

“He'll be here. Very soon, I'm sure. Have you known him long?”

“Just met him tonight.”

There is a long pause as she shifts on the bed, trying to make herself comfortable.

“Are you going to..... you know... do it with him?” I don't know why I said that.

“You betcha!” She smiles, “He's so hot, don't you think?”

“How the hell should I know?” That came out too rough. I didn't mean it to.

She glances at me, uncomfortably. My tone must have managed to penetrate her drunken haze.

“Mmmm, I'm so tired....” she closes her eyes. She's pretty enough, I guess. Big lips, high cheekbones, large arching eyebrows. Nothing I'd look at twice, but Lewis certainly seemed interested in her. I know him, though. Alcohol and hormones combine to get the better of him, and in the morning he'd want nothing to do with her. Still, there had to be something about her he found attractive. I mean, it had to be more than just that she has a big rack and probably laughs at all his jokes. I don't want to believe he's really that shallow, but I know, from personal experience even, that he is. Maybe depth and intellectualism are overrated. They haven't done much for me.

Quietly, I sit on the bed next to her. I hold my head up and grin, like he does, and softly stroke her hair. She smiles and mumbles something. My heart is racing, but I lean down on one elbow, putting my head in my hand. The movements come quite naturally; I've done my homework. After a few minutes of gathering my courage, I whisper into her ear.

“Who's my baby... Come on, who's my baby?”

She stirs and turns her face to mine. “Lewis?”

“Hey, baby,” I say, and then I kiss her.

I don't know how long we are at it. At first I want to stop immediately. Its not the guilt so much as her breath, which carries a sickly sweetness of beer and bile. After a few minutes, however, I'm lost in her lips, carried away by an excitement I can't explain. It flows up my back and down my arms, a tingle of something wonderful I have always wanted but didn't know it. I even allow myself, just for a moment, to touch her leg in a way I have seen him do on a few occaisions, and she sighs with the pleasure of it just the way other girls do for him. I'm terrified he might walk in at any minute, or that she might realize I'm just me, the dorky roommate, and push me away, or that she won't and we'll go all the way before I know what I'm doing and I don't know if I'm ready for it. My God, my God, I think I could die right now.

Not too much later, she stops returning my movements and lays still. I pull away and listen to her breathing and realize she is asleep. I suppose thats some kind of comment on my kissing abilities, but I didn't expect much better. It was my first time. I get off of the bed gently, so as not to wake her. I should just go. It's enough. But I don't go. I walk to the mirror slowly with measured steps. I get close to its surface and stare into its depths. Same eyes, same chin, same nose.

The mirror shatters, breaking my image into a thousand copies, cracking like thunder and waking Alice up with a start, sending droplets of warm blood down my hand and onto the carpet.

It wasn't who I wanted to see.

The Puzzle

2005-07-19T19:16:00.000-07:00

The first draft of another story for my writing group.

The Puzzle

He was in his study working on the puzzle, as usual, when the end came. If he had been paying attention to anything else, looked up from his table or abandoned, just for a brief moment, the intense concentration that totally absorbed his mind, then he might have seen it coming, or done something, anything to prevent it. But perhaps not, perhaps it was simply an inevitably, part of the complex pattern of the puzzle that he would now have to take into account in his work. Either way, there is nothing to be done now, afterwards; the work must continue, somehow, though it seemed impossible - for he is so close now, he is sure, so close to solution, resolution, peace.

In fixed determination he stares down at his work. In some random part of his mind it registers that he had not yet had any food today, but the thought is soon brushed aside by the sheer weight and gravity of the puzzle before his eyes. The room is overflowing with it; parts of it lay on the floor or taped to the wall, or laid out with care and precision on the table before him. The puzzle is overwhelming; it is enormous, a thick framework of images and words and symbols dancing together in a chaotic tumble of paper and ink and magic marker to a rhythm only he can hear or understand. Newspaper clippings with various sentences underlined in blue pen, photographs captioned neatly and with great detail, scribbled notes on torn pieces of paper, magazine advertisements, coupons, press releases, historical documents, contracts, pages torn from various books--these are the pieces of the puzzle, and as he is always looking for more there are more pieces now then there had ever been. The boxes stacked neatly in the corner are filled with hundreds more. It is a momentous undertaking that has dominated his life for over six months.

He isn’t sure when the idea for the puzzle came. He just knows that as long as he can remember he has felt that there was something he was missing, some vital piece of information, perhaps even obvious in its way, that he had failed to see or understand. He often feels like everybody else knows something important that they aren’t telling him. He wonders if its all a big joke; that they watch him feel his way feebly through life handicapped, crippled without the whole truth while they all snicker behind his back. He is fairly sure that this feeling is paranoid and baseless, but he is also fairly sure that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. There is a smile that everybody, it seemed, could use but him - a smile that communicated a kind conspiratorial condescension, an “I know something you don’t know” smile of the sort the planners of a surprise party give their unknowing friend on his birthday, or like the person who knows you’re going to be fired gives you just before your boss calls you into your office. At every memorable or vital moment of his life, the smile was present on the face of a friend or stranger, mocking him as if in pity that he still had no idea what was really going on. He had first seen it on the face of his father, many years ago, after his goldfish had died. His father had said that things like that just happen, but then he had smiled that sad, knowing smile which told his young son in a moment of intuition that he was hiding something. After that, the smile was present at birthdays, at injuries, at joy and sorrow and at every point of transition in his life. The memories of the smile were now written out clearly on pieces of scrap paper occupying central positions in the puzzle on the table before him, every single one – even when he had met her, the one he loved, had shared his life with. The waiter in the expensive restaurant had smiled the smile at him the moment he realized that he was love with this woman across the table. Love too, then, is a part of what he does not understand.

And he has to know. He can no longer bear the feeling of being lost, floundering half-blind through the choices life brought him, seeing the smile on every face. The answers are out there, he knows, out in the crowded mess of a world that surrounds him. That world, that reality, that mess: that is the puzzle, and he is going to solve it from his little study in his little house. For the whole premise of the puzzle is that the answers he is looking for can be found buried out there, like the image in one of those magic eye posters. At first glance, there is nothing but a chaotic clatter of color and shape set to no particular order, like a Pollack painting, erratic, whimsical yet bearing the same inexplicable sense of meaning hidden, somewhere, for those who knew how to look for it. Then suddenly, a shift of the eyes, a change in focus, the brain switching gears and cutting to a new camera angle, and there is a train, or a dolphin, or a ball floating before your eyes; a three-dimensional, definite, clear, and communicable image. One day, he thought, the puzzle would yield the answers in a similar fashion. One day he would put the right piece in the right place and look at it like he'd never done before and suddenly, POP, he would see it – the truth, the meaning, in all its glory and radiant absoluteness.

The work progressed slowly at first. He would cut out a news article or scribble down something he saw or heard and then put them in a little file folder so he could refer to them later. She had even helped him at first, pointing out things that she thought he might be interested in, indulging him in his private eccentricities with great love and patience. Slowly, however, his collection began to dominate his thoughts as he began to feel more and more convinced that there was something vital there to find. The last half of a year he had held it above all else, above food, above sleep, above her. She began to slip away, gradually, as the puzzle took her place in his heart. She was loving, she was patient, but she was not a fool.

“I’m leaving,” she had said from the doorway of the study, where he did not look up to see her. He had merely muttered a distracted goodbye as he stared intently at a picture of a man crying and tried to fathom its elusive meaning.

“I’m leaving” she had repeated, “and I’m not coming back.”

It took a few moments for her voice to penetrate the cloud around his brain, several moments more for him to interpret the sounds into words, the words into sentences, the sentences into one fearful meaning. He had looked at her then, staring inquisitively into her sad brown eyes and, waiting just a moment for the silence in the room to wash over them, asked only this: “Why?”

“You’re good with mysteries,” she said, smiling sadly, “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” And then she was gone.

He stared at the doorway where she had stood, his blood cold in terrified shock. Her smile, as she left, was familiar and cruel and burned into his mind with painful clarity. He had seen it on the face of a hundred men and women he had met, but never on hers, not until this, the loneliest of moments. It had haunted him in dreams and nightmares, in good times and bad; it had signaled the beginning of his love, and now it signaled the end. It was fitting then, he thought wryly, that he should be in the study working on the puzzle, as usual, when that end came. He had quickly torn a piece of paper from a battered notebook and transcribed this latest experience with the smile, his hand shaking. It is a monumental clue, perhaps, the smile, her absence, the pain that was collecting into a knot in the pit of his stomach, the clue that could finally set him on the path to enlightenment.

So the work had gone on. This most recent of tragedies would be explained, along with everything else, once he unlocked the mystery of the pieces before him. And yet it is more difficult, somehow. His concentration, once unwavering and impenetrable, often falters for a moment, and many times he looks up towards the door of his room at a noise he believes he heard signifying her return. He tries in vain to push her from his mind, but her face keeps floating up on the pictures and postcards and papers that he shuffles and reshuffles before him.

He had always known a pit in his stomach, the feeling of loss and incompleteness, but it was stronger today. It threatened to drag down his determination to solve the puzzle, to move, to live. There was a sense of pointlessness so complete now that he began, slowly but with increasing fervor, the validity of the puzzle. Could he really find the answers, and, more terrifying still, were there really any to find? What was it, anyway, this thing he held in his hands? The secrets of the meaning of life, his whole life's struggle resolved, defined, annotated? Or was it just paper and ink and fantasies, and everything that really mattered had walked out of that room and never came back?

No, he cannot believe that. Not after so many years of certainty, not after everything he had given to come this far. The darkness clung around him, hung from him like a heavy chains, pulling him down to despair, but he knew he must press onward. There may be no future for him now, nothing bright for him without her, but he must know. It is the only way to redeem himself.

With this in his mind, he looks at the puzzle again, and then it happens. The light in the room shifts, and he cocks his head slowly to one side. There is something there, something slowly unraveling into sense, forming into ideas and words. It seems to bleed from the puzzle, slowly at first, and then suddenly in a rush. He pushes pieces aside, replaces them with new ones, highlights words, circles parts of photographs. He is not certain where this path is leading him, but he knows, somehow, he knows it will lead him to the end. His heat beats thunderously in his chest, his hands shake, and just before the last piece is put into place, just at the threshold of solution, he lets out a cry of terror and closes his eyes tightly.

He is afraid to see. He is so close, all it would take now is to open his eyes, but his eyes won’t open. His stomach is twisted into knots worthy of a boy scout, his mouth dry and his head pounding. If he looks, it is all over. The finality terrifies him. The possibility that it was all in his head, that there is nothing to be seen, scares him more. And there is another possibility that suddenly occurs to him, one he has never paused to consider before. Perhaps he does not want to know what the puzzle hides, what the answers behind the smile revealed. He would not be the first to decide the truth is too terrible to face, too all-encompassing, too true. His ignorance could be a blessing, and he'd never know until he lost it forever if it was any worse than the alternative.

This is the moment, he knows, when the search ends. When he opens his eyes, he will either see the hidden meaning long since lost, or hidden, or misinterpreted, however terrible or enlightening, redeeming or damning - or he would see only a crowded table in the lonely house of a lonely man and portents of an empty life. Before him lies either the hand of God revealed, the purpose and the reason - or a god he himself created, an altar to an idol on which so much that was precious had been sacrificed. There can be no turning back, for he cannot close his eyes forever, as much as he might try, as much as he might cling to the darkness and hide. The end has come.

With a deep breath, with tears falling down his cheeks like rain, he opens his eyes slowly, cautiously, and blinks into the light of the puzzle.

“Ah,” he whispers.

An Exercise in Non-Sequentiality

2005-06-14T09:05:00.000-07:00

This is another short story for my writing group, which is supposedly supposed to meet tonight. I chose the theme this time, which is "time travel," and this is what I wrote at the last minute. Its very much a rough draft, just me playing around with some ideas, but I'd like to revise it into an actual story once I figure out exactly where the heck I'm going with it.

An Exercise in Non-Sequentiality

“Three.”

The world goes dark, and suddenly I am everywhere.

I am feeling everything I have ever felt, seeing everything I have ever seen, all at once, all now. The entire span of my life is a moment, is this moment, is now.

I am an infant, I am cradled in the strong, young arms of my mother as she hums softly to me. I am safe and secure and satisfied. She is warm, and the light is dim. I am half-asleep, half listening to her heartbeat. I am wrapped in a soft wool blanket that rubs pleasantly against my smooth skin. I am also holding her hand at my father’s funeral, and kissing her cheek at my wedding. It is all now.

At the same time I am happy as I hold my first-born son in my arms. His face is red and tight, but he is sleeping. He is covered by a soft white blanket covered with blue cartoon animals. I am twenty-six, and I am wearing a large pin that says, “It’s a boy!” My wife sleeps on the hospital bed next to me. She is exhausted, but beautiful. My son is perfect, and I made him He is crying, he is calling me Daddy, he is teaching me to use the VCR, he is telling me he is gay. It is all now.

I am walking down the hallway of my house, in the dark. I am tripping, and I am on the floor. I am both at once. I am fighting a boy my age on the playground at school. He is teasing me, I am shouting at him. I have a black eye, my eye is fine, he is swinging his fist, he is my friend and shares his lunch with me.

I am also, at this same moment, sitting in a sparse room in the prison, listening to
a gray-haired man in tiny spectacles talk enthusiastically to me.

“Cause and effect,” says Dr. Verbek, “are an illusion. They are inventions of our minds to understand reality. We see reality in a limited sense, yes? We only see one moment of a time, then another, then another, in order. We see a ball thrown at a window, and because the ball hits the window, the glass breaks. Cause, effect.”

His mustache is wagging back and forth eagerly, like it does when he is excited about something he is thinking. He has to control himself to keep from speaking too quickly, and to use words that I understand.

“But imagine, Mr. Peters, imagine for sake of argument there is another kind of being, one that sees time unlike we do. Perhaps they see each moment of time in reverse order as us. To them it appears that the widow comes together from many pieces, then a ball moves away from it. They would interpret cause and effect differently than us, yes? They would see that ball emerges from the window because the window assembles. The window unbreaking could appear to them to be the cause, not the effect, do you see? Or imagine yet another being that sees all moments of time at once, instead of one at a time. To them it is impossible to determine which is the cause, and which is the effect. They don’t know what these things are. The ball is thrown, the window breaks. One does not cause the other, they both are, at the very same moment.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I am saying.

“No, of course not. No, to your mind it does not, because for you sense is cause, effect, second after second. For me too. But imagine with me, Mr. Peters. It is important, I beg of you. Imagine that cause and effect are merely interpretation of reality the way that we see it, and that to see reality and time in a different way cause and effect could be interpreted differently.”

I am trying to puzzle out what he is telling me. I am also saying, “I do,” to my wife, who looks radiant and beautiful and happy. Her dress glows celestially, she looks like a goddess. Our families are nearby, smiling and weeping for us. I am putting a ring on her finger, she is putting a ring on mine. We are kissing each other. We are also fighting, laughing, making love, and ignoring each other.

Right now, I am watching TV, ignoring all else. Right now, I am neglecting my family and I am taking them to Disneyland. My wife is shouting at me, and I am not even pretending to listen. At this moment, my wife is taking our three kids and five brown suitcases and leaving the house. We are in court, we are divorced, and we are getting married. We are leaving the kids with a babysitter and heading to Vegas. It is all now.

I am in divorce court, and I am in criminal court. I am found guilt of larceny, of laundering money from my company. I am sentenced to prison. I am meeting Dr. Verbek for the first time, I am volunteering to be a test subject in scientific experiments, I am hearing the rumor that subjects get better food. I am talking to the gray-haired doctor.

“Its great to imagine,” I am saying, “but what good does it do? We can’t see beyond our perception of reality. Its impossible to view reality and time any different than we do.”

“Yes! Good, you understand, Mr. Peters. You understand that we are limited. We only see space and time in one way. We cannot even see space and time as one, even though we know they are one, we still perceive them as two different phenomena, yes? We cannot expect to change our perception of time now, in the present, in each moment we are in. We cannot expect to change what we call reality, which exists outside of ourselves; after thousands of years of thinking and arguing, we can’t even agree on what reality is! But, we can, perhaps, change our reality that exists inside of us.”

I am making out with my prom date, I am eighteen. I have never kissed, I have kissed a thousand times. My body aches with desire, it is sleepy, it is hungry, it is satisfied and spent. My prom date is bored, I am taking her home, I am frustrated. I am asking her to prom, she is saying yes, I am elated. I am angry and hurt too. It is all now.

“What are you talking about?”

“We only exist in the moment, Mr. Peters. We are limited, as we said. We can only see now, and only right now. This is the only information our five senses can receive at one time.”

“But we remember the past.”

“Yes! Very good, Mr. Peters. But these memories, these images of the past, they are not reality, in one sense. They are not information being received by our body at this exact moment. But they are reality for us, yes? They are the reality on which we act, believe, make decisions, feel emotion. It is all based on this information in our minds which does not exist in the now, but to us it is reality. And we take these memories, and we interpret them according to the rules of sequentiality that we are familiar with. We see in them cause and effect. This determines our reality, the reality within us.”

I am twelve, and I am trying awkwardly to smoke a cigarette in our back yard. My mother is yelling at me, grounding me. I am ashamed. I am proud and confident too. My mother is weeping, she is calling out my father’s name. I am listening at her door.

A man is firing a gun. My father is bleeding. He is carrying me to bed, he is spanking me with tears in his eyes. He is dead, he is alive. He is buried in the ground.

“What I am saying to you, Mr. Peters, is that our memories, perhaps, can be interpreted in more than one possibility, you see? Cause and effect is an illusion, an interpretation. We imagined the possibility of a being that sees time non-sequentially – that is, outside the sequence with which we are familiar: A leads to B leads to C and so forth. Now imagine the possibility of interpreting our memories non-sequentially. Imagine, Mr. Peters!”

My wife and I are crying. We are looking through a glass window at a tiny blob of flesh. I hold her hand tightly. Our fourth child is two days old. Our fourth child stops breathing. All of our children are being born, all of them are children, are teenagers, are adults. My fourth child is a girl, her eyes seem half-open, half-closed. Her left hand is curled into a tiny fist. There are horrible plastic tubes coming out of her nose. She has her mother’s nose. Her head has the tiniest fuzz of light brown hair. The room smells sterile, unfeeling. The light is too bright, the background noise too loud. A man down the hallway is laughing. My wife sobs a prayer. My mouth is dry.

“The human mind, as you know, is an amazing instrument. It captures everything we see, touch, smell, or hear, or taste and it keeps it filed away inside our minds. Imagine that we can bring all those memories up into our conscious thought at will, in whatever order we like. Imagine that we can bring them all up at one time, all at once, or in reverse order, or whatever we like. We will then have simulated what it would be like to be unbound by our limits of time, to break free of sequentiality. We will be able to see memory interpreted by a different set of rules than the cause and effect that we know.

“Can you do that?” I ask.

“Yes, Mr. Peters. We can.”

A man is shouting, running wildly through a crowd of people. He is waving a gun. My father is pushing me, my father is chasing the man, he is throwing at baseball at me and I am trying feebly to catch it. I am six, watching him, and I am forty-six, taking money that isn’t mine. My father is hurt, he is dying, he is fine. The man is pointing a gun, he is firing. He is being arrested.

I am living. I am laughing, crying, breathing, eating, defecating, talking, kissing, working, listening, sleeping, playing. I am.

I am strapped onto a table in a bright, sterile room. Dr. Verbek is leaning over me. He is saying, “Very good, Mr. Peters. We will now begin phase two.”

And then he says it again. He releases me from the table and leaves the room. I get up and put on my prison uniform, then I leave. I meet with him from time to time in his office. Eventually, I am escorted out of the prison to a court. The court releases me and I go to work. I start giving money to my company, secretly, a little bit each day. Each day I grow less and less lonely, less and less desparate.

I go to court, and my wife is there. The judge marries us. We fight a lot, at first, but with every day that passes it is less. Our children love us and need us more every day. They grow smaller and more innocent, until they are so small we pack them carefully away inside my wife. We take my fourth child out of the ground. She starts to breathe and then we gently place her inside my wife, where she will be safe. We cry, because we are happy our daughter is safe now. Every day I kiss my wife more passionately, we make love more often until it seems we do nothing else. My last son, who was gay a long time ago, disappears. My wife and I love each other desperately. Eventually we have a big party celebrating the end of our time together. Our marriage is over, but we are both happy. She is dressed like a goddess.

We both head to college. I see her from time to time, and then eventually not at all. I spend my days forgetting how messed up the world is, and playing around with buddies. I attend a big ceremony celebrating entering high school, and my mother is so proud. I get younger and stronger. Every day I can run farther and faster. My mother gets younger too. Her wrinkles smooth out. My voice gets higher, my body hair all disappears. I become more innocent and naïve every day. I need my mother more and more. She begins to hold me, now and then, and then eventually all the time. I keep shrinking and shrinking until finally, one day, we take my father out of the ground, and to the hospital. We take him from the hospital to a park, where a man points a gun at him which pulls pieces of metal from his body, heals all his wounds. And my father takes me home, and we are a happy family.

Eventually I get so small that I cannot walk, or talk, and I rely on my parents to do everything. I do not worry about anything, or anybody. I am at peace with the world. One day we go to the hospital where I am gently placed inside my mother, where I am safe. And then, inside her, I slowly disappear until I am nothing.

It’s not a bad way to go.

And then suddenly, I am remembering my life in order from birth until now. Everything happens in reverse order, I get older and older and everything gets worse and worse. It is horrible, to watch things fall apart, to watch people die. I want to weep, but I move quickly through my life, quickly, catching up, returning to the sparse room in the prison where a gray-haired man in a lab-coat is leaning over me.

“Just relax, Mr. Peters.” He is saying, “Take a deep breath. I will begin the procedure on the count of three, do you understand?”

“Yes,” I am saying.

“One… Two…”

Journal of an Old Jedi: Two

2005-06-12T10:14:00.000-07:00

My failure was absolute and terrible. I was so confident, in the brashness of my youth, that I could train young Anakin as well as any Master, as well as Yoda. He was the Chosen One – on his shoulders rested the fate of us all, yet I took upon myself the responsibility eagerly, confidently. I thought I could teach him to control his fear, his anger, his ambition. I was wrong. This was my first failure.

I sensed his growing attachment to another, in a manner unsuitable to a Jedi. I said nothing, did nothing to warn him that such things bring unbalance, bring fear that can twist one to the dark side. I turned away, I ignored it, I hoped it would resolve itself on its own without my interference. This is my second failure.

I was not there when he was tempted, when he was weak. I left him alone and unaided when the full power of the Emperor and his own fear weighed upon him. This is my third failure.

I did not spare him, or aid him, or finish him, or weep over him when in anguish he reached out to me, crippled and scarred by the fires of Mustafar. He cursed me then, with what little strength he had left. His anger and hate left me scarred too. I walked away. I abandoned him to the flames, to the dark side, to death. This is my last and greatest failure; for this alone I shall never forgive myself.

The galaxy has paid for my mistakes. It suffers under the hand of Darth Vader, a monster I helped create as much as the Emperor. And I hide here on a barren planet and do nothing to stop him.

Because of the boy. It is his destiny to face the man that was once his father, to break the chains of tyranny, to bring peace and freedom. I know this to be true. The spirit of my old master has helped me peer into the future through the mystery of the Force; the boy is our last hope.

And yet he is not the only child of Anakin Skywalker. So long have I focused on the son that I often forget the daughter. I wonder where she is now, and what her life must have been like growing up in royalty on Alderaan, and what part she is to play in what is coming. The Force must be strong in her, as well. She, too, is a child of destiny, and destiny's children are never spared.

Last night I felt a battle rage above this quiet planet. I had not felt the surge of combat in many years. Once it was the heartbeat by which I lived my life. In my exile I have known only quiet and peace and isolation.

There is no doubt now. I have hid from the growing conflict, and it has found me. It will not be long before it is time to leave this place.

The Fence at the Edge of the World

2005-06-11T15:31:00.000-07:00

This short story was written for my writing group, JLA writers. The first two lines were provided for us, and we had to take it from there.

The Fence at the Edge of the World

There was always that one kid by the fence. How could the rest of us feel okay if he wasn't? He didn't do nothing special, just stood there all alone by the fence, looking at the wood intently as if he could see clear through to the other side. He became a familiar sight on our walks to and from school, or up the hill towards the cemetery, this strange kid; after awhile we stopped noticing him. It wasn't very remarkable anymore. It was right for him to be there, must be. Reverend Mathers raised a stink about it at first, of course, and a lot of folks had agreed with him it was downright unnatural, but eventually even he said it must be the will of God. Around here, everybody has their place, and once we all realized that this boy's was by the fence, well, it became kind of reassuring to see him there, you know? Not that any of us would have changed places with him, not for all the world. But this kid, he sorta belonged there and that was all right with us.

Of course, it wasn't always that way. Before he came along, we all avoided the fence and tried not to think of it at all. The fence bordered the west side of our town and rand as for north and south as anybody had ever cared to go. Far as we knew it ran on forever, around the whole earth. People used to think the earth was flat, and that you could fall off the edge of it into nothing where you'd keep on falling and falling and falling forever, but people used to be ignorant. Not like now. The earth is round, like a big ball, and the way we thought of it this fence just sort of went round the whole of it. Nobody exactly knew how it came to be there, but nobody exactly cared to find out. Reverend Mathers said it was a manifestation of the will of God. Old Farmer Craig said our ancestor's ancestors put it up, and it took them a hundred years to do it. Stew Philips, the constable's son, said it was just a lousy fence. The rest of us didn't care to think of it at all. We had chores to do and families to raise, and what had the fence to do with us? The whole town had this kind of unspoken agreement just to pretend that the thing didn't even exist.

Until that kid came along. None of us rightly remember, now, what his name was or what family he came from. He was a short, kind of chubby kid who couldn't run too well or throw very far, which wouldn't be so bad since lots of kids ain't exactly gifted that way, but this kid, he didn't really get good marks in school or play an instrument or join a club or anything. Everybody has their place, round here, and he just couldn't find his, at first. Well all that sort of made it hard, you see, for any of the other children to make friends with him. A lot of us felt sorry for him, though. He was a strange kid, always said the strangest things you couldn't make head or tail of and then he'd get all upset when you didn't catch on to his meaning. Odd kidd, one of the kind who'd sit all by himself during recess and stare at a blade of grass like it was a hundred dollar bill. The whole time, he'd just sit there and stare and he wouldn't play ball or climb the bars or nothing. And all the time he just never found where he fit in, and it made a lot of people pretty uncomfortable.

Until the day we found him by the fence. At first he stood about ten feet off, looking at it like it was some kind of priceless painting and not moving an inch. As days went by he moved closer and closer until he stood right up against it, with his nose all but butting against the wood, still staring so hard you could hardly see him blink. Well, it made a lot of us might upset, that. A bunch of mothers in town thought it was bad behavior fora boy his age, and a poor example for the other children, so they raised a stink about it and petitioned our mayor. But the mayor couldn't see no harm in it, and said there wasn't any laws or ordinances against it in the town's constitution, and though he didn't approve of it himself he didn't see what he could do in the circumstances. A number of others tried to talk to the kid, kind of show him his error and get him to act like everybody else. They'd walk up to him by the fence and try to shoot the breeze like they was his best friends and ask him what he was doing all friendly like. And he'd say, I'm looking at this fence. He was a riot that kid. We all could see he was looking at the fence but what we wanted to know was why? I'm thinking, he'd say, I'm thinking about what its like on the other side. That kid said the strangest things.

Well, eventually Reverend Mathers took an interest in the whole thing. He said he saw it all as part of his obligation to the people as the leader of the flock to help the boy, to, as he put it, fetch the lost sheep and bring him back to the ninety and nine. We weren't clear on which ninety nine of us he meant, but we were sure that he'd fix it all just just the same. Well, the Reverend walked right up to that boy and asked him waht he was doing, and the kid he answered just the same as usual, except then the Revered asked him all sorts of complicated religious questions about the nature of the fence, and its purpose, and God, and the like. But the boy didn't say much about that, only that he reckoned it was just a fence. The Reverend asked him what he thought was on the other side, and the boy said, honestly this is what he said, he said: the edge of the world. Well the Reverend laughed at that, and we all did too, when we heard of it, because that was ignorant talk. The Reverend told the boy that he ought to try harder in school, especially in geography class. He told the town after that, that he didn't see no harm in the kid standing by the fence, that maybe it was part of God's plan, who, he reminded us, moves in those mysterious ways.

Anyway, the next part could have been avoided, most likely, but nobody could have predicted what that kid would do. See, word of the kid's talk with our reverand got around, and some of the other boys stared teasing him a little, as boys do. They were giving him a time about it, one day, and that kid, he decided he'd find out for sure what was on the other side of that fence, and before we knew it he'd gotten a hold of tools or something and he made himself a tiny little hole in the fence that he could look through. When the other boys saw that, they scattered fast enough, because that kid was acting like a crazy man, poking a hole in the fence and looking through. They ran and told their parents and word got around fast enough. But by the time the constable had come and pulled the boy away, he'd already had a good long look through the fence, and he had quite a story to tell.

The boy said, when we asked him, that he saw people on the other side of that fence. Well, that caused quite a commontion for a while, let me tell you. Everyone was all aflutter with the news and the mayor even called a town council to decide what we ought to do about it and to calm everyone's nerves. He stood that boy up right in front of the whole town and asked him to tell us all what he had seen. He was nervous, that odd kid, and just kind of stared at his feet and mumbled that he had been looking through the fence and he saw people moving around over there. What kind of people, we asked, and he said just people. Well what were they doing, oh just moving around. Nothing special. City Hall was in an uproar, people shouting this and taht, and all the while the mayor waving his arms and shouting and trying to keep everything calm. But then Reverand Mathers stood up and we all fell silent and respectful like we do when the reverend speaks. He told us he'd been praying and studying the scripture since he heard the news and he said we were the children of God and these folk on the other side of the fence, well, they weren't people really. They were children of the devil and that's why God put up the fence in the first place, he said, that way we'd have no trouble with them. Well that settled the matter for us, though we were pretty worked up about it for a while. There was a big row over the kid, whether he ought to be kept away from the fence for his own good, but in the end we had just gotten used to hime there... that was his place, you see. Everybody has their place here. So we let him go back to the fence, when he wasn't at school and all, but the mayor ordered him to plug up that hole to keep peace in the town.

He was something of a celebrity for a few days there, as some of the more curious among us set to asking him a few questions about what he saw. Were there really people over there, they'd ask, and he'd just nod. Anything else? And that kid would say, the edge of the world. And that's all he'd say except once he said, if you want to know go look for yourself. That scared off any more folks with questions. Its one thing to wonder what the inside of the asylum looks like, and its quite another to want to try the funny jacket on yourself.

Eventually things quieted down again, and everybody knew about the people on the other side of the fence, even though we didn't talk about them, and when Reverend Mathers referred to the children of the devil in his Sunday sermons, we all knew who he meant. It was frightening, actually, though we all tried to hide it. The fence was always a little unsettling, but now it was downright intimidating. It didn't bother the kid none, though, and he just kept staring at it as usual. But that became a normal sight, and soon we got used to the idea of the fence, and the people on the other siade, and the kid, and everything went back to normal, or as close to normal as it could. Children were born, some of the old folks died and were buried up in the cemetery, and the rest of the people ate, and slept, and talked and just generally went about their business of living and filling their place. We had just about forgotten about the kid again by the time he climbed the fence.

It was a sunny spring day, and the children were on their way home from school when they saw that kid carrying a ladder towards the fence. Well it didn't take them too long to put two and two together, even though they couldn't hardly believe it. They went and told everybody, and just about the whole town showed up at the kid's spot by the fence to see if it was true. Sure enough, that kid had the ladder set up against the fence, and he was standing by it very seriously, like he was the mayor at a town council or something. He was waiting, like he wanted a big crowd to gather before he did it. We all just sort of stood there in shock, thinking he couldn't be in his right mind, and watched while he stepped up on the ladder and climbed, one rung at a time, higher and higher. Soon he was higher than even the tallest of us, but he didn't look down or slow his pace any. He just climbed slowly, steadily, and our eyes followed him, and our mouths hung open, and now and then somebody would gasp or cover their eyes as if they couldn't bear to watch. It made us scared, sure, but it made us sad too. We couldn't explain it, why we stood there and watched and didn't do nothing. Finally, finally, the boy was within a hand's reach of the top of the fence when Reverend Mathers came running up, huffing and puffing like a madman and shouting for us to stop him, to brimg him down and to take away the ladder. A couple of the men dashed forward and yanked the ladder out from under the kid but he was too fast. With a little leap he grabbed on the top of the fence and dangled there. Well there wasn't much we could do then. He was too high up for any of us to reach him, though we shouted for him to let go and we'd catch him. He didn't pay us any attention though, just struggled to pull himself up and over the edge. We just watched.

He wasn't the strongest kid, and not the lightest either, so he was having a bit of trouble pulling his own weight up. His face looked all red and puffy and horrible from what we could see, and his arms were shaking like a leaf in the wind. But that kid, he just didn't give up. He pulled and pulled and squinched his eyes all tight until finally he got one leg over the fence and kind of hoisted his body up so he was lying there on top of the fence. And then he did something crazy. He stood up. He brought his legs underneath him and just stood up on the top of the fence and looked all around him frantically like he was drowning. For one moment, the sun seemed to reflect off him just so and he shone brightly, and his face... well his face was all triumph and glory and wonder and freedom, like we'd never seen it before. It took our breath away to see it, and that's a fact. He threw his arms out wide and smiled at the other side of the fence and cried like a baby. Then we all shouted in terror, but there was nothing we could do as his balance shifted and he gave us one last, pitiful look before he toppled over the other side and fell and fell and fell and fell.

Two Sonnets

2005-06-11T07:55:00.000-07:00

The following two poems were written for a writing group that's been meeting off and on (mostly off) for the last couple of months. Our only instruction was to follow the sonnet format.

You know, it isn't death I mind so much
As dying slowly, like we do; each day
I watch firm skin droop down, and feel the touch
Of death in each strong bone's mortal decay.
I've heard them say that youth is wasted on
The young; perhaps its true, for if somehow
That energy and strength which now are gone
Returned, I would appreciate them now--
When I was twenty, I assumed when I
Was old (it seemed so far off then) I'd know
Somehow the answers and the reasons why;
Know how to be content with letting go
My yesteryears; I'm sixty-two and still
I do not know, and think I never will.

Since that your mighty rage, dear friend, still burns
Divinely in your might heart, while yet our brave
Achaen men are piereced by Trojan spears
Without your aid, at least send me instead!
Yea, I will go; upon my chest I'll place
Your plate, upon my arm I'll place your shield,
Upon my head I'll place your helm, and all the men
Of Troy shall flee before my face in fear, for I
Shall be Achilles now, at last. I fear for you,
For anger such as yours brings only suffering;
May heaven grant I bear it all for you, and if
It please the gods to punish such a rage, I pray
It light on me, for I stand in your place.

Journal of an Old Jedi: One

2005-06-11T07:33:00.000-07:00

The end is near.

The end of my seclusion, my hermitage, my penance. I sense it, a growing intensity in the heartbeat of life that is the Force. Great events are coming, and I can not forsee their conclusion. One thing is certain – a time of change is at hand.

My name was Obi-Wan Kenobi, a long time ago when names had purpose and words had meaning. Now I need no name, for I live alone. The locals call me Ben, but that is no matter. They also call me old man, crazy hermit, wizard. They know nothing of me: I am exile, a stranger hiding from the past on this desolate and remote planet.

Tatooine.

I could not have known so long ago, when I was young and foolish, the events that were to be set in motion based on my own recommendation to seek refuge in this place. It was because we came here that my master took a strange young boy into his care, changing my life forever. Was the Force working through me, then? Or perhaps was it the subtle hand of the dark side, already casting a shadow over the eyes of those who should have been more watchful. It was not merely luck, that is certain. In my experience there is no such thing as luck. To happen to land at one particular settlement out of a thousand, to happen to meet one particular boy out of a million – it is clear there was some great power at work. But to what end?

It is fitting, somehow, that I should end up here. And wise, given the circumstances. He will never come back to this place. However much he may have changed, I know him well enough to be certain of that.

It was right to bring the child here, to his adopted family - the most obvious of places. The best place to hide is often in plain sight. My old apprentice did not think to search here, and the forces at his command do not bother with such a remote system. Now the child is a man, and I feel the time is at hand for him to face his destiny.

He had barely left the womb of his dead mother when I brought him here, so long ago. I held him in my arms as she died. It was not easy to give him to the safekeeping of another, I admit. Jedi do not form attachments, but I loved the child dearly as I had loved his father. But I knew nothing of caring for infants. He needed caring, security. A family. Once, the Jedi Order would have been that family, but the Order is merely ghosts and memories now. So I brought him here, gave him new parents to replace the ones who were lost. I assumed that before long I would begin to instruct him in the ways of the Force, so that the light of the Jedi would not completely die. I assumed I would be nearby to guide him, to teach him, to watch him grow, to become his friend. This was not to be. I have not seen his face in many seasons now, but I know he is here. I can feel him, off in the distance. The Force swirls around him furiously; a child of destiny, like his father.

It has been my lot in life to bear the responsibility for destiny’s children.

I cannot fail again.