Happiness – a study on paradise lost & found

What could have been – if only I did this or that – what if – if you really think about Eva, it’s amazing how little we actually dedicate ourselves to the whole idea of living in the present. I reckon as humans, we have it tough when compared to let’s say mosquitoes or houseflies – they don’t mull over things like we do, they can’t afford too could be they can’t, as they lack processing power – but you know what Eva, that may not be such a bad thing after all – I mean we can say many things about turning and churning in the folds of those moments we can never get back. You could even successfully argue that’s part and parcel of what it means to be a homo sapien – like not being able to change the way you look or frown. You know part and parcel of being part and not apart from the human condition. But I don’t believe mothernature dealt us a bum hand. I happen to believe that if nature meant for us to be melancholic, we wouldn’t have the life expectancy we have. Neither would we need so much time to grow up – it makes no sense at all Eva. So this is my theory. Are you ready? Here goes, I happen to believe mothernature provisioned for all us to overcome our innate bent for sadness. I mean, if you asked me which part of the brain, this happy mass of cells live. I wouldn’t be able to tell you – but, what I do know is it has to reside somewhere in the deeper recesses of our brain – it’s probably a little vault where we store these sad memories, episodes and scenarios. A room that I imagine may not look so different from one of those dimly lit casino’s. You know the type where the guy who deals you the hand happens to be an oily emigre with a heavy accent and where you have a solo singer belting up tunes on a white piano – the sort of place that’s two parts chiaroscuro and the rest I call the place of possibilities. You know don’t you that place where X marks the spot – and in this place there has to be thousands of images and scripts all stacked up like used carton boxes. Here some of us may contend to read the same book over and over again; others may just be stuck on a paragraph like a broken record – in other words, Eva this place that I call the temple of yawns is a place where each and everyone lives forever in – those moments when you’re staring out at the world blankly is when I know that you’re in that sort place. But sometimes Eva, we can’t live in the past forever, not if we want to live and not merely exist in the present – sometimes Eva we would do well to ask, correction I mean demand of ourselves, who is to say what’s best, good or will end happily ever after? I mean living isn’t about looking back and superimposing our experiences on the present to make sense of it. If we do that most of us probably wouldnt have the balls to get out of bed in the morning. That’s why I think as humans we need to grab whatever chance we have of happiness and not worry about what happens next. And that idea of chance may not be anything but the flismy idea of hope or faith. Hope that whatever I am doing right now will end up making a better tomorrow. Faith in the idea that life isn’t like old leather where its made softer by the whome act of just living one day at a time. No Eva, that whole idea of living in the past or our fears doesnt add anything to the whole idea of happiness – if anything it has to take in the way a thief robs you of something really precious. The way I see it we probably get no more than two or three bites of the cherry in a life time and that’s only if we learn to live in the present – if you’re unlucky, it comes and goes when you’re really too young to make sense of it – but if you happen to be fortunate and this form experience if usually the case, it comes later in life, when you probably have the wisdom to make sense of it all – even then, if you don’t act on it; all you will really do is watch it go right by.

And where might this station be Darkness?

Somewhere in a far and distant country call Regret Eva.

That sounds pretty much like hell Darkness.

Yes Eva, the hottest place in hell.

Tell me how do you know this place so well Darkness?

Eva, I write sappy love stories for a living – you’re be amazed how many yarns I’ve sold online. And the strange thing about it; when you write, it has to come from somewhere. There was this time, when I wasn’t really getting any way in my writing; when I decided to go deep into the souls of my characters. You know like one of those submarines that go so deep that everyone makes a pact of who should be eaten first – you could say, I lived my life through these characters and that’s when it all came together.

What?

The land of smiles – the place where X marks the spot.

Darkness 2011 – due to a channel disruption in the Strangelands – this transcript was forwarded by KDD Norwegian Wood courtesy of the Interspacing Navigation Guilds – the Brotherhood Press 2010. This has also be published in Ekunaba and Phi Beta Kappa and broadcasted throughout the Strangelands.