A tiny tale for a big tale…

There’s an interesting perspective when you see how some expectations work; for instance at alcoholic anonymous meeting: those who don´t have full sordid story, don´t feel right with themselves; such a thing seems to be the goal at being there. A musician is participating in a festival and instead of feeling like going to do the best, feels wrong at the fact of not being shown off enough. A married girl, happily married girl, feels like she need to find herself attractive by getting flirts from someone who’s not her husband; let’s say the husband is an already conquered land and, at least in a way, she feels she needs the chance of expansion, and expansion is also an issue, a teenage issue; vestiges of the unsolved. I toke this from Douglas Coupland: “It's not healthy to live life as a succession of isolated little cool moments. [Either our lives become stories, or there's just no way to get through them.]” and this is probably what the issue is about: we have not yet gotten through our little stories and there’s a big tale nowadays which involves us all. We, the Venezuelans, must deal with the fact that after almost twenty years gathering cool moments, there is indeed a bigger scenario and it demands everyone do something for the country… Yes, but what’s it? I mean, there can be a common thought; a collective idea of it, but just that and it’s obviously not enough. Who’s going to step forward? Stand? Lead? There are many, there are some, but that’s just potential and this is what we should be debating in order to get through it: Postmodernism is gone, little cool memories are no longer defining us, there’s more, there’s something wider, for instance more important, and when such a thing finally gets inside us all, we’ll make changes happen. But for now, let’s hope, expect, wait, support, and stand for…

chauffeur with a car

Bridge in construction, that’s what I read from the banner every time I go to Animus. I sleep for some dreaming and just then start the path, flying low until finally I get to a cave: an entrance says Thoughts, and due to its size, not so high to me at least, I’ve got to stop flying.

I take a walk: my steps don´t settle enough because the soil is soft, like sand or mud, I can´t notice. I feel myself willing to keep up; there’s no rush, time in dreaming is patient, so I just wonder with my hands and sense some texture, grab a little of it and try to see, to take a closer look: it was gray but out of my knowledge. I could imagine that’s how moon sand might look like but it is because what I’m carrying in my bag (I forgot to say I carry a bag every time I dream) I usually fill this backpack with names: I like to think I dream with real people but really I ignore, or maybe I’m the ignored one, I haven´t figured it out the scope of my desires. For now, let’s move on over this soft and gray (neutral) soil. Yes, because it is free from any judgment.

I keep walking; see some questions spread and several answers hanging: doubts of my reality, of my certain future. Future is not uncertain, uncertain are facts when they’re sudden and it depends, because sometimes Present leaves pieces as a warning that a bit of a whole will be completed and that the time for awakens is more sensed than in dreams’; therefore, impatience might come from outside, unlike this patience, that comes within.

I read When, Why, Because as well, but the rest are just ellipsis.

I open the bag and grab some pronouns; the first clue for the questions spread. Doubt is like opportunity; both have issues with people just like the names I bring onto my dreams. It’s not necessary to say them loud, the voice of the dreams has its own language, anyone who sees someone sleeping knows it when this asleep talks; it is some kind of no translatable dialect.

I start wondering inside the cave: why she? When you? Why we? The wind blows and pushes the answers, I assume a You towards me is an I, so the answers lies on me but I don´t know what to say. I check the bag again but get sort of nervous; I’m afraid not to pick the right name (yes, random and chance are strange while you dream on) I finally prefer the doubt and wake up…

Nothing special, just a day full whys and whens, for example: why so much traffic, so many critics, so stupid fundaments? There’s not a single because for any of my whys but, well, let´s wait until tonight…

It is said (better than known) Love reflects itself in many ways, for instance: a metaphor related with time, about love I’m talking, might be how long the beloved one takes to reach your eyes at knowing you’re waiting at the entrance to her home. If it’s the same home for both, well, I’m not sure (I guess there’s more than a why) Reasons varies and love (as I just said it) reflects in many ways.

I was a lucky; I could fly a little more before going back to the cave, before running away from widow questions and orphan answers. I go on, open the bag; Animus is a bridge, a bridge inside a cave: this big is this cave, these many are my doubts. I wake up…

I forgot to say I’m a chauffeur with a car of his own: take me there, pick me up, and yes, just when I was about to pick her up, Boom! I crashed the car. Another day with whys…

Moon sand got wet but hands were no longer my path, I’m barefoot, one doesn´t know how’s looking while dreaming. I sense a shore, a silvered sea with some few waves. I stepped on from answers to windows, windows without transparency, like frames, like a gallery, a gallery which frames look like stars and as stars enlighten. I see some like my face, yes, through these windows. I didn’t just see my face through it, for example: I saw myself stroking the legs of an important name I always carry in my bag; it is the name of my present, a present which will be future, for now. Through other window I saw me as a child; as an animal through another, an unknown animal. There’s a windows, old, blurred; the texture of the weather is strange but I figured it out by a pair words written with a finger on it, just like someone else would have been here before, someone who got bored, tired. The words were: Silence and Oblivion. This, along with the questions, looks like an afterthought. Since there’s some antagonisms in the bag, I may do some conjectures: why don´t I forget? (For oblivion) Or when this silence? Because I remember you, and from the noise I… I wake up…   

There is a certain feeding for waking up on a bad mood when sleeping with doubts; some people dream with things they can’t have, some others with things they can’t understand. That explains the reflects in the morning, those moments in front of the mirror trying to accept ourselves, to accept that there’s just a shaving machine, a makeup set. The day promises to be the same, but today I don´t work, I’m without the car, so I’m just taking a walk…

Curiously doubts fade away with the steps, and unlike dreams, there’s sort of a comprehension while keeping up on the sidewalks. Perhaps it’s just oblivion and silence, and next dream remember…

It was a beach at night, a beach inside a cave with moon sand and a bridge, and the windows, the words, the memories, everything making noise while I go on, and I’m again in the same dream. Probably pronouns are no longer needed because the only one here is me, it means I am: I’m who walks and doubts due to sensations and uncertainties of everyday and there’s no more sand, nor sea for my steps. There’s just a banner at the end of this path: Bridge in construction.

Versión en español: aquí

aren't words actually more dangerous than actions?

Imagine this, like The Martians Chronicles, that reading books were as playing a musical instrument: we lay our index finger above a book's word sentence and we move it on along with our voice reading; like playing a trumpet, a flute. Words come out in synchrony with the dance of our finger: it might be great but it won’t just be like that. There's a little beyond, and it's that thoughts will also come up from it. So playing book reading will not only be for feeding our spirit (like music does) but getting some knowledge as well. This could mean that at some point people might be empty of ideas, so they'll need to play book reading...  In a way, I guess, we all need some book reading but there can be a kind of danger, and it's that what words are going to be read, what sentences, what ideas. Words may become more dangerous than actions, and that's my doubt for this sharing piece: aren't words actually more dangerous than actions? 

It is by a fast gesture how the rest notices about us

Let's leave something here. Just for reflection. I saw about an hour ago a lady trying to make it to the next street as fast as she could. She was running energetically. I could see a sort of desperation in her face. It felt so close, so close that I got sad at it… I felt some kind of sorrow on my own. A little later I started wondering if such a feeling tends to be sensed by everyone, and then I realized people don't usually spend too much time at sympathizing neighbors, at least no more than making themselves sympathized. The thing is, and that's perhaps why I want you to read this and also write me about: that it is precisely when we force our body for a quicker move that we realize how we might be feeling, and a little beyond: it is by a fast gesture how the rest notices about us. For instance, if there´s a bit of compassion around, it may be shown by looking at our faces when we act mechanical rather than when we carry intentionally a sad expression expecting to be noticed...  

we tend to be more objective under second languages, so why not using it?

Regards.

I believe we establish a deeper and more effective exchange of ideas by written words. When someone reads, brain builds a space for thoughts, for memory visitors and reflection guests. They all share and develop themselves in such a room a person is creating with every page turned or every chapter finished.  It is the way we cuddle from the inside. Writing is also so, but from a different perspective. The way we catch a moment in a picture we catch a thought over a paragraph as well. 

I like to catch my thoughts and also enjoy building my own space of reflections by reading others, that’s what I like from posting, that’s what internet and blogging are very useful too. I understand there must be a cover letter every time somebody intents applying for a job. This is something we’re not used to back here in Venezuela. Most of my writing job is posted in Spanish. I’m Spanish speaker but I’m trying this in English because in way I’m enjoying it. Besides, our consciousness changes with the language we speak in (I read an article about it) we tend to be more objective under second languages, so why not using it? I thank you in advance for letting these lines reach your lecture…

Sincerely yours

Orlan Silva

@OrlanSilva