A Dream of Darkness

Some Days it’s hard to tell if I am awake, that I’m not still in a dream of darkness where I walk and talk the same but I feel that fuzzy little feeling. I’m completely in the moment, not thinking about the past or future, just listening to the now go by. In awakened reality it’s not so fuzzy and magical, it’s loud, stressed, and dark. 

I know I am awake because I can feel the weight of today on my chest, which is especially bad today. After all, today is a big one. I push the covers back, it’s warm today. I head to the kitchen, which is conveniently 10 feet away from my bed. Sometimes when I turn on my stovetop it sparks, it’s unsettling, like the opposite of what is, if that makes sense. I don’t like it, it hurts my eyes. You would think I would’ve mastered something as simple as making tea but I still manage to miss the cup with my teabag every time. 

Anyway back to my big day. I’m taking the train across town to visit my sister and her baby girl. It’s a long ride, a couple of hours but it will be worth it, I haven’t heard my sister’s voice in ages. My niece can probably speak full sentences by now, I’ll have to feel if her hair has grown to be as curly as my sister's was when we were kids. 

I picked out my best shirt to wear. The softest one I own. The fabric is ever so velvety and smooth. It’s one of those things I’ve had hanging in my closet for ages because it feels “too nice” to wear. My sister loves nice things, she’s one of those moms who put her kids in velvet sleepers even though their spit-up is going to ruin them anyway. I honestly can’t blame her, she’s a good mother, and if it makes her happy to put her baby girl in a stupid, expensive sleeper then go right ahead. 

The train is loud today, although less loud than normal. Maybe it’s me, maybe my hearing is going at the ripe old age of 25. I don’t feel like finishing my crochet project anymore, finishing the podcast I started listening to or eating the snack I brought. So naturally my mind begins to wander as one does on a two-hour train ride. I feel the bumps on the tracks and hear others breathe and cough. I wonder why we are the way we are. How is our body made up of 60% water? Why can some hear their own voice in their head while others can’t? Why do we have useless body parts like tailbones and eyes? 

Just before the train makes it to my stop I notice the feeling filling my chest become heavier or maybe lighter? Either way I fear something is wrong. However, I can’t quite tell what it is so I continue moving to and up the ramp to get out of the station. That’s when I observed it. Observed it? There has to be a better word for the sense that I can now somehow feel. I first observe shapes. I blink because my eyes begin to burn and the shapes disappear, I open my eyes and they come back, interesting. Eyes can feel? Shapes, not just what I call the outline of things I feel but something I can now feel with my eyes? The sensation is overwhelming. I can’t describe it. Whatever it is, it's the opposite of what it was, and it just keeps getting more intense. I turn my head to observe a big circle shape starting to peak over the horizon. It appears what I would imagine hot to appear like. I then hear someone in the street yell, “I can see!” 

See? See, that sounds right. I can see. I start to see the different textures of objects around me, the textures but also something else that I don’t think there’s a word for yet. The best I can describe it is with feelings. This new big object in the sky feels happy and energetic, but the sky itself has a sadder ambiance emanating from it. I notice my shirt is a loud thing even though it doesn’t make any noise, the look of it reminds me of the taste of cherries or something else strong and tart. I decide I must continue my way to my sister’s house before I decide anything else, like if this is the most wonderful and magical thing I’ve ever experienced or if it’s just terribly overwhelming. 

I knock on my sister’s door. I knock harder because the banging noise is much softer than normal. She opens the door calmly but with tears in her eyes. I ask her what’s wrong and instead of answering, she pulls me inside right in front of a mirror. I’ve always thought mirrors were pointless and dangerous, a textured painting would be much better. But once I see the mirror I understand its value. It takes me a moment to realize that I am observing myself in this object. After that, I noticed my sister and how similar we appear, unlike the people I saw in the streets who I now realize appear very different from me, I see all the ways me and my sister are alike. I remember our mother saying we have the same button nose, and then she would boop both of our noses to prove her point. But now I can see it. See it. See my sister. I turn to see her, she appears soft and warm, like all those good feelings you feel when you are with the people you love. My sister’s baby girl then walks into the room. I focus on her and then back to my sister then back to her. They appear the same but baby girl’s cheeks are softer, and her eyes bigger. Seeing her makes me want to crinkle my nose and smile until my cheeks hurt. I begin to tear up too. 

I spent the rest of the day with my sister and niece. The big warm circle in the sky is apparently called a star and is what causes this seeing sensation. The news says that the star emits light which is a funny word, it sounds like “Kite”. 

This “light” just kept getting more and more intense until eventually, it began to fade away. I was in the darkness again. I don’t know if I want the light to come back, it hurt my eyes and made some things I thought would be beautiful, ugly. Now that it’s gone, I feel like I’m missing something. I think I want it to come back. 

When I woke up the next day I knew I wasn’t dreaming, not because of any weight on my chest but because I could see the light. I can see the light.